Flight 4892
by godfreyraphael
Summary: AU. Miley Stewart is a pilot for Cash Airlines, with a non-remarkable flying record. However, when a series of events conspire to try to bring her plane down, she finds out that she may just be in for the flight of her life. Rated T for language and content. Features loads of characters from different universes.
1. The Cold Light of Day

A/N: So I've decided to try my hand in some more fanfiction. My current one (Fighting Land for Princess Protection Program) is currently stalled, and in the intervening period, a lot of ideas came running into my mind and decided to stay there. Most of these are original ideas that will probably end up still in my mind, but some of them were easily adaptable into fanfiction format, and so I decided to write them up first.

Now, for a little background. I'm a fan of Hannah Montana, and of Miley Cyrus. I still like her, but the stuff she pulled off recently just staggers me, for lack of a better term. You can say that I'm still living in the past, because in my mind's eye, I still see the old Miley, and the new one is like an entirely different person for me. So in this story, imagine Miley here as Miley during Hannah Montana and a little beyond.

Now, for some context about the story itself. I'm a fan of _Air Crash Investigation_. It's this series which focuses on air crashes and the reasons why planes go down and that kind of thing. And I also watched this movie called _Flight_, starring Denzel Washington. This story will draw elements from that film, but it's not just purely _Flight_ starring Hannah Montana; instead, it's got elements from various things that I've seen and heard, and mixed them up to create an original story. Or at least it's original as a piece of fanfiction. I'm sure nobody's written about Miley/Hannah becoming an airline pilot!

Anyways, here's a new story for Hannah Montana, hopefully offering a brand new perspective to her character. Enjoy.

* * *

Miley Stewart woke up to the sound of a ringing digital alarm clock.

It took her mind some time to remember that she was not in her Malibu beach house. It took her a much longer time to remember that she was actually in some kind of three- or two-star hotel deep in Brazil.

Miley—full name Chelsea Ray Stewart—was a pilot for Cash Airlines, currently holding the rank of captain. Cash Airlines was this large airline based in Los Angeles that was a minor competitor for the real major airlines like American, United, and Delta, and while it operated a large network of domestic and international scheduled flights, it also had a small section entirely devoted to charter flights, which incidentally accounted for a full one-fourth of its yearly income.

Recently, Cash Airlines had been chartered by a large group of American soccer fans to fly them to Brazil to watch the FIFA World Cup. Miley was the pilot-in-command of one of the three Boeing 747s that had flown to Brazil, and she and the rest of the planes' aircrews had then decided to stay and join in on the World Cup experience.

They celebrated when the United States soccer team won against Ghana. They were celebrating what looked to be a victory against Portugal when that team equalized, and that led them to drowning their sorrows in drink. And then they drowned their sorrows in drink once again when the US lost to Germany.

When it was time for the round of 16, the Cash Airlines crew in Brazil were not sure that America could win against Belgium, which is admittedly one of the better sides in the tournament. And when America lost 2-1 to Belgium in extra time, they dealt with their country's loss the way they had been dealing with its losses before: drinking themselves almost to death. Well, maybe not really to death, but for someone drinking alcohol for the first time, the amounts that they consumed would have been deadly.

And of course, Miley Stewart, like many a person who had consumed more alcohol than their body could reasonably handle, had made a very stupid decision: she had slept with a fellow crew member.

Miley couldn't remember much of what happened last night, but she remembered booze—lots of it. Drugs were certainly, involved, too—she distinctly remembered snorting coke. After she snorted that coke, the night became a blur. And she remembered blurry sex in her room. Well, it was morning now, and she would now know who was the lucky—or unlucky—bastard who managed to bed her.

Miley sat up on the bed and swung her legs to the floor, giving her a good view of the bush between her legs and the two averagely endowed mounds on her chest, which were covered by her long brown hair. This glance at her "assets" reminded her that she had to clean herself up before reporting back to the Cash Airlines office for the inevitable exodus of disappointed American soccer fans. And Miley knew that her co-workers knew that she had slept with a fellow co-worker, but the higher-ups in Cash didn't have to know about it.

As Miley stood up to walk towards the bathroom, her companion from last night finally grunted himself awake. "That's certainly a good sight to wake me up in the morning," he said, staring at Miley's hindquarters.

"Like what you see?" Miley asked him, posing suggestively under the doorframe.

"Oh, yeah," the man replied. "Can't say that my girl's given me the same view after a night like last night, though."

"Speaking of your girl, she's so gonna kill you when she finds out that you cheated on her. And listen to me carefully: I said when, not if."

"Oh, you're gonna be as dead as I am when she finds out," he replied, "so you got just as much an incentive as I do to keep this under wraps."

Miley just laughed and stepped into the bathroom. Twenty minutes later, after taking a quick shower, she allowed herself another look at the body of the man she had just slept with. His abs were faint but well-developed, and he had nice, big pectorals, too. But the most important thing about him was the power between his legs. He was neither too big nor too small, and he had this amazing ability to last for a long, long time, even after resting for just fifteen minutes. It had to be genetic, Miley thought. Teenagers didn't last as long as he did after a whole day of rest.

Beck Oliver was no Jake Ryan or Nick Jonas, but he was definitely a nice, strong man. And Jade West—Beck's girlfriend, and a woman with a reputation, in Cash Airlines at least, of being a very jealous woman who guarded her man with the tenacity of ten pit bulls—was very lucky to have Beck for herself, at least in Miley's opinion.

Beck was now sitting up on the bed, having turned on the television while Miley was still in the shower. He had been hoping to catch a replay of last night's soccer game—or any other soccer game, for that matter—but it seemed that this hotel was not really a place where many Americans stayed, because there was no channel on the TV that spoke English. Beck was now stuck with listening to a Portuguese recap of USA vs. Belgium. "You done already?" he asked.

"Yeah, I'm done," Miley replied.

"Thank God," Beck exclaimed. "I can't watch this shit anymore. It's all in Portuguese!" As Beck went into the bathroom, Miley sat down on the bed, reached for the remote control, and turned off the television. "Hey, Beck?" she called out.

"Yeah?" Beck replied from within the shower. That thought conjured up another image of a naked Beck in Miley's mind. But now was not the time for such thoughts now.

"Just so we understand each other," Miley continued, "what happened to us was just for that one night, right?"

"What? Of course, Miles." Beck's head popped out from behind the door to the bathroom. "Look, Miles, I've got a girlfriend. You've… sort of… got a boyfriend. I think. I don't know. Probably some actor or singer or somebody."

"Ah, yeah, of course," Miley replied. "Jake Ryan and Nick Jonas. Yeah, to tell you the truth, Beck, they're not my boyfriends, anymore. Jake and I were too young when we were dating, and Nick and I… let's just say it did not end the way we both thought it should end."

"Hah! Tell me about it. I go through this on-again, off-again bullshit with Jade every month or two!" Beck sighed. "Still, it's good to know that someone of your background has gone through the same shit that I have."

Miley chuckled. Beck's relationship problems were as famous among the employees of Cash Airlines as Miley's own exploits with the rich and famous. Well, some of them had been famous when Miley had rubbed shoulders with them.

"So, Beck, aren't you going to ask me how I managed to get an actor and a singer under my spell?" Miley teased.

"Nah," Beck replied as he stepped out of the bathroom with only a white towel wrapped around his waist for clothing. He leaned on the doorframe and added, "Besides, someone who's been a teenage pop star sensation must have her own reasons." This elicited another chuckle from Miley.

"I gotta ask you this question, though," Beck said as he sat down beside Miley. "Why'd you leave showbiz? I mean, I know—hell, we all know—that you revealed yourself to be Hannah Montana just so you could join your friend Lola in Stanford-"

"Her name is actually Lilly," Miley interrupted. "Lola's her alter ego."

"As I was saying," Beck continued, "why did you leave showbiz and join us unwashed masses at Cash Airlines? It's gotta be more than just wanting to be in college with your friend."

Miley went silent for a moment before she replied. "Beck, this is gonna be the first time that I'm gonna say this to anybody who's not my immediate family."

"Okay," Beck said, sitting up a little bit straighter. "I'm listening," he added as he looked into Miley's eyes.

"I got tired, Beck," Miley said. "I got sick of always being in the limelight, night after night. It got to the point where I thought about ending it all, you know. It didn't matter how it came: from a bullet through my brain, from an OD of a cocktail of drugs, it didn't matter, as long as everything was finally over. But eventually I found that I couldn't do it. I was afraid that if I killed myself, I would just ending up hurting my family and friends even more. And I couldn't do that to them, as much as I wanted to stop singing and acting as Hannah Montana. So, instead, I just announced that I was retiring from showbiz, music, everything. And with that, I cut my ties to everything that had been from what I now call 'my past life.' And here I am, opening up to you. You, Beck Oliver, of all people."

Beck smiled, as if saying, "I get that a lot." And then he said, "But why did you choose to become a pilot, though? Why not, I don't know, continue on as Miley Stewart?"

"Oh, come on, Beck, you know that everyone knows that Miley Stewart and Hannah Montana are one and the same. Besides, like I said, I got tired of being always in the limelight. I wanted to be anonymous after having my face being almost instantly recognizable every time it comes up on the TV. And becoming a pilot looked like a logical decision to me at the time. I mean, you sit up at the very front of the plane, behind closed doors, and all you have to worry about is bringing your passengers to their destination safely. And you only have to speak to them through the PA, and we all know that everyone sounds like Darth Vader over the PA, so there's no risk of someone recognizing my voice and saying, 'Hey, our plane's being flown by Hannah Montana!' So, decision made, case closed."

"You always had a fantastic sense of humor, Miley Stewart," Beck said. His and Miley's faces were mere inches apart from each other. Despite the two of them knowing better, they moved closer to each other, and both closed their eyes in anticipation of what was to come. But just as their lips were about to touch, both of their cellphones rang at the same time. Both of them groaned as they moved away to pick up their respective phones.

"It's Jade," Beck said, almost to himself, as he looked at the screen of his phone. "I gotta take this, Miles. Excuse me."

"Yeah, go on ahead," Miley replied as she scrolled through the messages that she had received. One was from a fellow pilot, praising her for bedding Beck under Jade's nose, and warning her to watch her back in case Jade did find out, and was now planning how best to kill her. The other message was from the Cash Airlines office, telling her that she was about to go on flight duty again, for the flight back to Los Angeles. She ignored the first message and sent a brief reply of acknowledgement to the second one. With that done, Miley laid herself down on the bed and sighed. It was going to be a long, long day.

She had no idea of how right she was.


	2. Ground Inspection

Beck and Miley had tried to make sure that Beck could get out of Miley's hotel room without being noticed, but both of them knew deep down that everyone in Brazil working for Cash Airlines knew about their one-night stand, or would soon know about it thanks to their coworkers. After Miley had finally shooed Beck away, she cleaned herself up once again, and put on her uniform. She spent some time adjusting her blouse and her pants and her shoes, and she knew that she was doing that because of what she and Beck had done the night before.

Miley checked out of her hotel just more than an hour before midnight, and she took a taxi to the airport. She passed through the security checks in the terminal area quickly because of her status as a flight crew member, and she headed straight for the plane that would be under her command for this flight. Through the terminal's windows, she could already see the distinctive humped shape of the Boeing 747, with a deep purple underside and a big dollar sign on the tail, the livery of Cash Airlines. It was quite probably the same 747 that she had flown into Brazil almost two weeks before now.

Cash Airlines currently had ten 747s in service, with eight flying on regular, scheduled routes, and two others reserved for high-capacity charters. But due to the sheer amount of US soccer fans heading for Brazil for the World Cup, the administration had taken a third 747 out of regular service just for this charter to Brazil. The three jumbo jets were now sitting in various cities in Brazil, ready for the inevitable exodus of Americans and quite possibly a few fans of other nationalities out of the country.

Miley deposited her baggage, blazer, and cap in the cockpit of the plane, and then she took out a large flashlight, headed out of the cockpit, and went onto the tarmac. There, she turned on the flashlight and shone its beam on the 747's nose landing gear.

Miley Stewart was performing a ground inspection. It was standard operating procedure for every airline in the world, Cash Airlines included. Ground inspections were done by flight crews to check for possible damage inflicted on their aircraft during the hours between arrival and departure. There were numerous word-of-mouth accounts of pilots performing ground inspections and spotting potential problems on the ground, where they could still be easily remedied. And while these ground inspections had sometimes caused delays, pilots would be quick to say that it was better to be delayed and alive, rather than on time and dead.

Miley walked a path under the plane that took her to its landing gear, engines, and basically its entire underbelly. When she was finally done with the inspection, Miley found everything she saw to her liking. There were no dents that weren't there before, leaks that had sprung after their arrival, or any loose objects on the tarmac that could affect the plane's flight. She nodded her approval to the ground maintenance guys, and she turned off her flashlight and made the long trip back to the cockpit.

When Miley entered the cockpit of the 747, she found a woman sitting in the first officer's seat. "Fancy seeing you here, Alex," she said to the woman.

The woman turned around and said, "Fancy seeing you here, Miley." Alex Russo—full name Alexandra Margarita Russo—was a native of New York City, and had joined Cash Airlines at just about the same time that Miley did. Alex had more experience flying the 747 than Miley had, but somehow she had only three bars on her shoulders instead of the four that she clearly deserved. There were rumors that Alex was "underachieving," but however such a thing could be possible in the airline industry, Miley didn't know, and didn't want to know.

"So you're my first officer tonight?" Miley asked as she took the captain's seat in the cockpit, the one on the left side.

"No, I'm just here to push some buttons and throw some switches, and then I'll be out of your hair already," Alex replied in her usual, uniquely sarcastic way. "Of course I'm your first officer tonight, Miles. Why do you think I'm here?"

Miley just laughed at Alex. She knew that the woman always talked like she had a point to prove. "So how's the pre-flight going?" she asked.

"It's coming along," Alex replied as she input a set of numbers into the plane's navigational computer. "Initial navigation waypoint set," she said.

"Are you sure you got the coordinates right?" Miley asked.

"Of course they're the right coordinates, Miley," Alex replied, a little too forcefully in Miley's opinion. "I did the math myself three times. They're good enough for the computer, so they're good enough for me."

"Don't be too hard on me, Alex," Miley said. "I just don't want us to end up like Mike Hotel 370."

"Don't jinx us, Miles."

"All right. I'm gonna shut up now and help you with the checklist. Whereabouts are you now?"

"Trimming the flaps."

As the two of them went through the pre-flight checklist, Miley asked, "Who's gonna be on the third seat?"

"Last time I checked," Alex replied, "Adrian Carr's our flight engineer for tonight." Adrian Carr had a reputation for being slowpoke tardy lazyhead who wouldn't move from where he was if it wasn't to save his ass. The only reason that Miley could think of was the reason why Carr was still with the airline was the fact that he was damned good at being a flight engineer. "All we can do is wait," Alex continued.

"True that," Miley said, with a grin on her face.

Just after Miley had said that, though, someone entered the cockpit once again, but it wasn't Adrian Carr. Miley and Alex turned to face the new arrival. "Sonny, what are you doing here?" both of them blurted out at the same time.

Allison Jade "Sonny" Munroe—of West Appleton, Wisconsin—was yet another pilot that had lots of experience with the 747, and deserved four bars on her shoulders instead of the three that she currently had, in Miley's opinion. Sonny sat down on the flight engineer's seat, looked at them like they were both drooling fools, and replied, "I'm your number three."

"What happened to Carr?" Alex asked. "Overslept once again?"

"No, worse," Sonny replied. "He went down with some kind of tropical bug that no one has supposedly seen before. He caught a fever the day before yesterday, and he was busy redecorating his hotel room brown the day after that. Erwin, Clara, and I just dropped him off at the hospital before going here. There's something about what he caught that makes it just not the same with the usual suspects."

"Yeah, well, hopefully he gets better," Miley said. "No, I'm serious. If what he has is as serious as you're making me think it is, then I really do hope that he recovers from this."

Yet another person entered the cockpit, but this time it was a man, and he was wearing a prune-colored vest over his white shirt and black slacks that clashed brutally with his red hair. He handed over a clipboard with at least ten sheets of paper to Miley and said, in a British accent, "Three hundred fifty-eight passengers and eighteen crew onboard, Captain, for a total of three hundred seventy-six souls. Most of them appear to be disappointed American soccer fans." He put emphasis on the word soccer.

"How about you, though, Ron?" Miley asked him. "What's your take on England's World Cup campaign?"

Ronald "Ron" Weasley let out a chuckle that could be considered bitter. "England never had any chance, Miles," he replied. "The BPL's got too many international players, and we English haven't been developing our own talent. Looks like we'll just have to wait four more years for that second World Cup trophy."

"Don't worry about it, Ron," Miley said. "I'm sure you'll get your second soon. Who knows, maybe that will be between good ol' England and the US of A."

"Oh, now that is high fantasy, Miley," Ron told her. "The United States will only make it to a World Cup final after someone scores seven goals against Brazil."

"Oh, wouldn't that be something," Miley said. "Someone scoring seven goals against Brazil. As if!"

"As for you, Sonny," Ron said, turning to face the flight engineer, "you owe me a favor." And then Ron left the cockpit, taking care to lock it behind him.

* * *

"Congonhas Tower, this is Cash Forty-eight Ninety-Two, requesting permission to take off."

"Roger that, Cash 4892," the Brazilian air traffic controller replied. You are cleared for takeoff on runway 17 right as number two behind Varig 737."

"Copy that, Congonhas, runway 17 right, number two behind Varig."

The Cash Airlines 747 moved onto the threshold of runway 17R, stopping behind a Boeing 737 bearing the livery of the Brazilian airline Varig. The 737 was one of the most popular twinjets in the entire world, and it was decidedly dwarfed in size by the fellow Boeing product just behind it.

"Can you imagine what would happen if we accidentally ran over those guys?" Alex Russo asked what could be considered a rhetorical manner.

"It's gonna be absolute carnage," Miley Stewart replied. "I don't even wanna be thinking about it." It could be considered a morbid conversation, but they both knew that it was just to calm their nerves.

The Varig 737 in front of them began its takeoff roll, and just a few moments later it was already a rapidly shrinking white dot in the night sky of Sao Paulo. The Cash Airlines 747 could have taken off almost immediately after the 737, but there were procedures in which aircrews had to wait for the previous plane's wake turbulence to dissipate before taking off themselves. And while Miley had a feeling that a 737's wake turbulence really wouldn't do much to the 747, rules were rules.

Finally, after ten minutes—supposedly sufficient time for all that turbulence to have dissipated—Congonhas finally granted Cash Airlines Flight 4892 permission to begin its takeoff roll. Miley moved her right hand from the control yoke to the engine throttles. Alex's left hand went over Miley's right as the captain brought the engines up to takeoff power. Behind them, the 747's four Pratt and Whitney engines roared to life.

"Congonhas, Cash 4892 rolling."

Alex then settled her eyes on the airspeed indicator, while Miley kept her eyes looking at the end of the runway, which was as yet still far off in the distance. Alex then began calling out their airspeed in ten-knot increments. At 190 knots, she said, "V-1."

"Rotate," Miley called out in reply, and she pulled back the control yoke. The nose of the jumbo jet began to lift up into the sky, but most of the plane's landing gear was still in contact with the runway. Soon enough, though, Miley heard the slight hint of landing gear going down the runway subside, and eventually vanish. She felt a pulling sensation in her navel that went away when the landing gear finally went silent. Once she was sure that the plane was fully in the air, she called out, "Gear up!"

Alex raised the landing gear lever to the RETRACT position. The lights indicating that the landing gear was fully extended went out one by one, and then they were all extinguished. "Gear up," she repeated.

"Flaps up."

"Flaps retarded."

Miley breathed out. It was twelve hours from Sao Paulo to Los Angeles; twelve hours before she could finally leave behind her memories of the events in Brazil. She had no idea that these twelve hours were almost the last hours of her life.

* * *

A/N: As always, leave a review if you liked it, and leave a review even if you didn't like it. Praise and criticism is both highly appreciated!


	3. Permission to Land

It was six-thirty in the morning when Cash Airlines Flight 4892 was finally within range of Los Angeles International Airport. The flight from Sao Paulo to LA had taken between twelve to thirteen hours, and a backup crew had flown the plane for half the duration of the flight to let the primary crew get some more needed sleep before they finally returned to the cockpit and land the plane. However, when the pilot of Flight 4892 requested for permission to land on the airport, they received a reply that they were certainly not expecting.

"Cash 4892, LAX," the air traffic controller replied, "you are to enter a holding pattern. We are simply overloaded at the moment."

Captain Miley Stewart of Flight 4892 looked at her copilot before turning her attention back to the ATC. "Say that again, LAX," she said. "You're overloaded?"

"Roger that, Cash 4892," the ATC replied. You arrived at a very busy time for us right now. We got a lot of other flights being diverted to us from San Diego and San Francisco."

"What kind of problems?"

"We don't know much of anything yet, and what we're hearing is all conflicting anyway. They're claiming everything from a strike to a riot to an earthquake. That's California for you."

"How's that gonna affect us? Our flight, I mean."

"We're sorting out all the flight as we speak, 4892. You're all gonna be landed as soon as possible once you're all sorted out."

Miley was not reassured much by the ATC's words, and judging by the looks on the rest of her flight crew, neither were they. But at least it was better than nothing at all. "Roger that, LAX," Miley told the ATC. "We'll be going quiet for now, but we will still be in touch." To her copilot, she asked, "What do you think, Alex?"

"I think it's really something serious," First Officer Alex Russo replied. "The ATCs take their jobs very seriously, and there's no way any of them will try to pull a prank on a flight crew. Worst case scenario is that it'll take them at least an hour or more to do all this 'sorting out.' At most it'll take them an hour and a half, but by then we should already be on the ground."

"Okay," Miley nodded. "We're agreed in that. Sonny, how's our fuel situation?"

Flight Engineer Sonny Munroe turned to look at her instruments before facing Miley once again. "We've got at least ninety minutes to a hundred minutes of fuel left," she said in reply.

"More than enough," Alex added.

Miley nodded. "All right, girls," she said. "We'll just keep this holding pattern until we finally get clearance. That okay with the both of you?" Alex and Sonny nodded their agreement. Miley then switched to the plane's PA system. "Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking," she said. "We'll be experiencing a slight delay in our arrival today due to a situation that has developed on the ground…"

* * *

An hour after Flight 4892 had entered a holding pattern in the skies above Los Angeles, Miley asked the ATC once again, "LAX, Cash 4892. How are we going with that clearance?"

"Roger that, Cash 4892, it's coming along," the ATC replied. "You are number fifteen to land on runway seven left."

"Sweet niblets," Miley muttered to herself. "Number fifteen to land. What else could go wrong?"

"Miles, the weather radar's picking up a big low pressure area just off the coast of LA," Alex said. "It's gonna be over LAX in five minutes or less. And our pattern's gonna touch the edge of the area, so we're gonna be in for some rain."

"Oh, this is unbelievable," Miley muttered. _You just had to tempt fate, didn't you_, she thought to herself.

They entered the rainstorm that had developed from the low-pressure area just four minutes later, just as Alex had predicted. As the wipers wiped off the rain that was pattering away at the cockpit's windows, Miley contemplated calling LAX again about their clearance, or just up and declaring an emergency. Finally, she decided to give the tower one more chance, and she switched frequencies and said, "LAX, Cash 4892. How goes the clearance?"

"Cash Airlines 4892, this is LAX," a different voice, a different ATC, said. "You are cleared as number sixteen to land on runway seven left."

"Say what!" This time Miley didn't even bother going off the comms. "We were number fifteen to land on LAX just five minutes ago! Now you're telling me that we've gone down to number sixteen?"

"We apologize for the inconvenience, Cash 4892," the ATC said, not sounding genuinely contrite at least to Miley's ears. "We are handling such a large amount of traffic right now, and the rainstorm's also added more delays to the landings."

"Well, you better get your stuff sorted together, and soon!"

"Is it that time of the month again for her?" Sonny asked Alex, nodding towards Miley's general direction. She took care to cover the microphone of her headset, but she was sure that the cockpit voice recorder would still be able to pick up what she just said.

"With Miley, you never know," Alex whispered back.

"Jesus Christ," Miley muttered to herself. "Things are going to shit down there. Five more minutes, and I'm going to declare an emergency. Get the cabin crew ready."

* * *

Beck Oliver, Cash Airlines Senior Air Steward, picked up the telephone mounted on the wall separating the front galley from the passenger compartment, and said, "Yeah?"

"Beck, it's Alex," Russo said from the cockpit. "There's all sorts of shit going down on the ground, and the captain's planning on declaring an emergency just to cut ahead of the line."

"How are we doing, exactly?"

"Well, we're not yet really low on fuel, but we're certainly about to hit it," Alex replied truthfully. "We're just about to fly on fumes now. Miley wants everyone back there to get ready in case we do go for broke."

"Got that." Beck then hung up, and then he called over the rest of the cabin crew. There were twelve of them in total, three men and nine women. Beck explained the situation to them as best as he could, and while they were all in agreement that the situation was alarming to say the least, they also agreed that there was no need to alarm the passengers just yet.

* * *

"Sonny, how much fuel do we have left?"

Sonny made a tutting sound. "Something's definitely wrong here, Miles," she replied. "According to the math, we should still have twenty to thirty minutes of fuel left. But every time I run them now, it says that we've only got ten minutes left."

"Are you sure you're doing the math right?" Miley asked. "Are you carrying the one, multiplying before adding, and all that?"

"Of course I am," Sonny replied, a little defensively. "That's why all this isn't making any sense. The math says that we've got at least twenty minutes' flying time. But the plane is saying that we've only got ten minutes left."

"That's probably a fault in the instrumentation," Alex added.

"Okay, that settles it," Miley said. "Now we're really in an emergency. Shit! Shit just escalated quickly. This was just supposed to be cutting in line. Now it's a real thing." Miley keyed the mike and said, to the LAX tower controller, "LAX, Cash 4892; we are declaring an emergency. There appears to be a problem with our instrumentation. According to our instruments, we only have ten minutes of fuel left, but our flight engineer's saying that we should still have twenty to thirty minutes left. We're not gonna take the risk."

"Cash 4892, LAX, we copy your emergency," the controller replied. "You are now to enter a holding pattern around waypoint NASSER, on flight level 120." Flight level 120 translated to twelve thousand feet.

"Roger that, LAX," Miley replied. "4892 out." To Alex, she said, "Get the cabin crew ready to prep the passengers. This is gonna be a fast descent."

As Alex got in contact with the cabin crew, Miley turned on the FASTEN SEATBELTS sign. "Seatbelts, ladies," she said. Aside from the conventional seatbelts that went around the waist, the pilots' seats were also equipped with four-point harnesses that resembled those worn by racecar drivers. "Ready?"

"Like hell I am," Alex muttered. Even in an aerial emergency, Alex's natural sarcasm still managed to make its presence felt among the rest of the flight crew.

Miley leaned towards the autopilot controls and turned a white knob. Beside it, a red display began counting down from the 14000 that it had been initially displaying down to 12000. The 747's nose began to tilt to a shallow downward angle. The four Pratt and Whitney engines began to whine as more air was forced into their intakes by the descent. But then suddenly, an alarm went off inside the cockpit. It wasn't a very loud alarm, meaning it wasn't a master alarm or something else that was serious.

Alex looked at the numerous instrument dials in the middle of the cockpit. "Engine four is losing power," she said. "Nope, make that engine four just lost power. Oh, man, this is not looking good."

"Shut it down," Miley ordered. Sonny reached out and lowered the throttle for the number four engine down to the IDLE position. "We'll wait for the plane to level out first, and then we'll try to restart it." The three of them waited as the altimeter settled to twelve thousand feet. As the autopilot held the plane level in the altitude assigned to it by the pilots, Alex and Sonny went over the proper procedures for restarting a 747 engine.

"Okay, let's try for twenty percent," Alex said.

Sonny moved forward the throttle a little bit. The central instrument display showed that engine four was now producing twenty percent of the thrust that it was capable of producing. "Okay, let's take it up to fifty percent now," Alex said. But just before Sonny's hand could move the throttle forward once more, the engine lost power once again. This time, despite their best efforts, the engine wouldn't start again. "It just won't start," Alex finally said in defeat.

"Okay, forget about engine four for now," Miley said. "We still have three working engines. We can fly on three engines, right? Besides, we only got a few more hundred miles to fly, and then this will finally be over. We can do this."

Seven minutes later, the crew could finally see the landing lights leading them towards LAX and safety. "Gear down," Miley commanded. Alex reached for the landing gear lever and lowered it. Slowly, the lights indicating that the landing gear was fully deployed and locked in place went on one by one. For a brief moment, the crew let a bit of optimism into their minds. Maybe they were gonna make it out of this emergency alive and unscathed, after all.

Suddenly, the other three engines went silent too. The entire cockpit went dark now that there was nothing to provide power to the plane, and everyone's ears rang from the silence, after having become used to the background hum of the engines for almost thirteen hours. Everything electronic within the plane, from the lights to the instruments to the flight computer itself, went out. The sudden silence was very eerie, and it set off a primal fear within the hearts and minds of everyone onboard the plane, both passengers and crew.

Miley looked at Alex in disbelief. Alex looked at Sonny in terror. Sonny looked at Miley in horror.

"We're fucked," Miley thought as she saw the ground below rush up very quickly towards, as if eager to claim its latest victim.

There was a horrible crunching sound as metal made contact with earth. And then came the earsplitting sound of metal being torn apart, and just as Miley Stewart felt that she would to tear her ears off just to keep from hearing that horrifying sound again, the world thankfully went black.

* * *

A/N: Once again, any comments and commentary are very much welcome!


	4. Wake Up Call

She had no idea how long she had been asleep, and when Miley Stewart opened her eyes for the first time since God knows how long, the world had become too bright. She squinted, and tears flowed from her eyes. Finally, her vision seemed to have returned to normal, and she began to take stock of her surroundings.

She was in a hospital room, if the white walls and strong smell of antiseptic were everything that she needed to know. She had more than a dozen wires and tubes on her body connected to an equal amount of complicated-looking machines. An intravenous line fed some sort of clear liquid into a tube in her arm, and when she tried to sit up, she felt something sticking into her lady area. She looked down and saw a catheter leading out from her vagina to a plastic bag filled with a yellow liquid that had to be her pee.

"Oh, sweet niblets," she muttered.

When she spoke, Miley saw three figures stir from the corner of her eye. Miley looked up, and she saw her father, her brother, and her best friend running up from the couches and chairs where they had fallen asleep while watching her. "She's awake!" they said. "She's finally awake!"

"Welcome back, Miles!" Miley's best friend, Lilly Truscott, said. "Man, Miley, you really had us all scared when the rescuers found you unconscious. We thought you weren't gonna wake up ever again!"

"Wait, what?" Miley asked.

"Lilly, you really should have gone easy on her," Miley's father, Robbie Ray Stewart, told Lilly. "She's still having trouble taking everything in."

"Huh? What are y'all talking about?" Miley asked once again.

"Don't mind us, Miles," Jackson, Miley's brother, replied. "We ain't talking about anything that's real important for you."

"Jackson Stewart!" Robbie Ray said. Jackson looked at their father, and he turned back to Miley and said, "All right, the thing is that you were already unconscious when the rescue workers finally managed to pull you out of the wreckage, and then your brain swelled up when the EMTs tried to treat you. They had to put you in an induced coma. It was supposed to last only twenty-four hours, at most. When you didn't wake up after twenty-five hours, Lilly and Dad here expected the worst. They thought you weren't gonna wake up ever again at all. I said that all we had to do was wait, and you would eventually wake up sooner or later. Kind of like old times, when you're supposed to wake up at like eight o'clock, and then you end up sleeping until noon."

"Yeah, right," Miley said, nodding her head. That was typical Jackson: the more he tried to say that he wasn't really worried, the more Miley knew that he was very, very worried. Just then, the door to her room opened, and a well-dressed black man entered the room. "There's my favourite pop star turned pilot!" he said jovially.

The man was Cornelius "Cory" Baxter, a successful pilot, businessman, and lawyer, and the current legal representative of the Cash Airlines Pilots' Union. Cory was originally from San Francisco, just up the coast from LA, and he had moved to Washington DC when his father had been hired as a chef for the White House. After college, Cory had entered one of Cash Airlines' sponsored flight schools on a whim, but it turned out that he had more than just whims in him, if his high marks during the training courses told the tale. As soon as he was finished with flight school, Cash Airlines had hired Cory almost immediately. Cory rose through the ranks quickly, and in his spare time he had begun investing his money on the stock market, of course with an emphasis to Cash. When Cory's stocks began to pay off, he became a very rich man almost overnight. There were rumors that Cory was the richest man in the whole of Cash Airlines, second only to the airline's reclusive owner, Cabot Dobson. And those rumors were most probably true. Cory could start up his own airline with his own net worth, but he was loyal to Cash, the place that had made him rich in the first place. And he had no intention of leaving.

Cory squeezed himself in between Jackson and Robbie Ray as he took up a place before Miley's bed. "Welcome back to the land of the living, Miles," he said.

"Yeah, I sort of guessed that already," Miley replied. "What happened?"

"You crashed."

"Fuck that!" Miley blurted out. "I know that we crashed! What I meant was what happened after the crash? Did the plane blow up or something like that? If the plane blew up, you better check for explosives, because we were running on empty when we crashed."

"Uh, Miley, about that," Cory said, and he gestured towards Lilly, Robbie Ray, and Jackson. Robbie Ray took the cue and said, "Well, we'll be leaving you with my daughter now, Mr. Baxter," he said. "Lilly, Jackson, come on. They've got some important business matters to discuss."

Once Robbie Ray, Lilly, and Jackson had left Miley's room, Miley turned to Cory and asked him, "What was that all about?"

"The crash of Cash Airlines Flight 4892 has now become a national and criminal investigation," Cory replied. "Everyone from the LAPD to the FBI to the NTSB's down here checking out the wreckage now. So, you know, can't really tell people about where we are in the investigation. Except for you, obviously."

Miley stuck her tongue out blew a raspberry. "Oh, please, Cory, stop it," she said with fake enthusiasm. "You're making me blush!" And then she turned serious. "All right, Baxter, give it to me straight now," she said. "How many?"

Cory looked Miley in the eye and said, "Three hundred twenty-eight."

"Oh, my God!" Miley said, shaking her head. "That many dead?"

"No!" Cory said. "No! Jesus Christ, Miles, sometimes you just don't do yourself any good!"

"All right, Cory, how many died?"

"Forty-eight, as of the NTSB's last count."

"Oh, shit!" Miley muttered, running her hand on her face. "Those were forty-eight who were under my responsibility! And they died during my flight. My flight, Cory!"

"Hey, Miley, don't kick yourself for it," Cory said. "You still managed to save three hundred twenty-eight people, right?"

"I guess you're right, man," Miley finally agreed. "But still…" Yes, she might have saved a lot of people, but Cory knew that the deaths of those forty-eight people onboard Flight 4892 would gnaw on Miley's soul for years to come.

"Okay, at least that part's finally over," Miley muttered. "What day is it, Cory?"

"July 15."

"Oh, shit!" Miley said again. The United States had been defeated by Belgium in the World Cup on July 1, and Flight 4892 had taken off from Sao Paulo at exactly midnight of July 2. If Cory was telling the truth, then Miley had been in a coma for a good fourteen days now. From her perspective, it was just like the moment between falling asleep and waking up, but to her family she was sure that it had been the longest fourteen days of their life.

"All right, man," Miley finally said after a few moments of contemplation. "Who won the World Cup?"

"Germany," Cory replied. "Made myself about fourteen million bucks in Vegas on that bet alone. But, you know what, Miles? A funny thing happened to Germany on its way to the World Cup Final. During the semifinals, they faced Brazil. And you know what happened? Germany scored five goals against Brazil in the first half. And then they got two more through in the second half. Sure, Oscar scored one for Brazil just before the game ended, but who cares about that? Brazil lost to Germany, 7-1!"

"I'll be damned," Miley said. "Maybe the 2018 final _will _be USA versus England, after all."

"What was that again?"

"Just something Ron and I talked about before the flight," Miley said. "Speaking of which, how's the rest of the crew? Alex, Sonny, Beck, Ron, Ervin, Clara, Ginny, Annabeth, everyone else? Are they all right?"

"Oh, they're all okay," Cory replied in an off-hand manner. "Except for one."

"Shit. Who bit the dust?"

Cory looked at Miley again and said, "Beck."

"Oh, God!" Miley said. "What happened to him?"

"I don't have all the details as of today, but rumor has it that he doesn't have a head anymore."

"Oh, God!" Miley repeated. "What are we gonna tell Jade?"

"Don't worry about it, Miles. I already broke the bad news to her."

"How did she take it?"

"Not very well, obviously. Look, Miles, don't dwell on it so much," Cory advised her. "What's done is done. Beck is dead, and there's nothing else we can do about it, except maybe just pray for his soul or something like that. Now this is what I want you to do: get some rest, get your ass healed ASAP, and let me do my job. I got this."

"Ah, shit, Cory," Miley muttered. "I give up. This shindig's all yours now."

"Thanks, Miles," Cory said. "Let me hand you back to your family." And just like that, Cory Baxter slowly made his way out of the room, just as Miley's family went back in. Miley had a lot of questions that she had wanted to ask the man, but her family came first, and they had a lot more questions for her. In the end, Miley Stewart just wanted to fall asleep again. But she doubted that her sleep from now on would be dreamless, not after she had learned the scope of the tragedy that was the crash of Cash Airlines Flight 4892.

* * *

A/N: Once again, drop a review if you want to say something about my story! Every little bit is appreciated all the same!


	5. The Men Behind the Scenes

Cash Airlines' headquarters was located in a tall, newly-built skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles. It occupied the top thirty floors of the building, and held the naming rights to the entire property for at least fifty years. Most of Cash Airlines' administrative functions were handled from this building, and there was dedicated office space in the building for monitoring all of the aircraft in its fleet for status reports and possible malfunctions. The topmost floor was reserved for high-level officials and their respective staffs, and there was a single expansive office specially reserved for the chief executive officer of the airline. The office itself was divided into an anteroom, a conference room, a workplace for the CEO, and a private restroom. There was enough room in the anteroom for three secretaries.

Cory Baxter walked into the lobby of the Cash Airlines Building, and strode purposefully towards the elevator. He greeted the girl manning the elevator, and then he waited as more people got into the elevator after him. By the seventieth floor, Cory was the only one left besides the elevator girl, and he nodded his head to her as he got off. As he entered the CEO's office, one of the secretaries stood up and told him, "Mr. Brabant is waiting for you in the conference room."

"Already?" Cory asked in reply jokingly, but it seemed like his little joke went over the secretary's head.

"Yes, Mr. Baxter," she replied. "Mr. Okazaki and Mr. Godunov are already in the conference room with Mr. Brabant."

"All right," Cory said, going into the conference room.

The conference room of the Cash Airlines CEO was a large and modern affair dominated by the liberal usage of glass on almost every available surface. A large glass table sat on top of a massive obsidian slab. Two walls made of tempered glass—the same stuff that was used to make car windshields—gave a breath-taking panorama of the Los Angeles skyline. Two rows of ten chairs with foam-padded glass backs flanked the two long sides of the table. At the head of the table was one of the few items in the office that wasn't made—fully or mostly—of glass; the high-backed leather chair of the CEO himself.

There were only three people in the room besides Cory Baxter. Two of them were the other legal representatives within the airline. James Okazaki represented the stewards' union, while Boris "Barry" Godunov was responsible for the mechanics' union. Cory often referred to them as Sulu and Chekov, mostly because they looked like the _Star Trek_ characters. The ones from the JJ Abrams film, not the original series. Meanwhile, the third man, who was standing before the full-length windows staring at the LA skyline, was someone that Cory knew really well.

He was Theodosius Brabant, known to the public, the media, and his close friends as "Theo." He was the CEO of Cash Airlines, and he was a tall, swarthy, and stocky Englishman with the distinguished bearing of a nobleman. Brabant had been close friends with Buford Dobson, late father of current Cash Airlines owner Cabot Dobson, since their days in Cambridge. When Dobson's venture into the air travel industry had become a profitable enterprise, he had hired Brabant as CEO, leaving Buford free to focus on his family and growing his fortune even more. When he died just a few years ago, he left the entire company to his son Cabot, up to and including the controlling stake of Cash Airlines. While this gave Cabot virtual power of veto over the airline's shareholders and board of directors, he rarely participated in board meetings, if at all. It seemed that he had delegated the job of actually running the airline to Theo Brabant, his tutor and mentor, so he could pursue the life of a rich and eccentric recluse.

Brabant didn't look like he had noticed Cory coming into the room, but when he spoke, he addressed the new arrival. "How's Captain Stewart doing, Cornelius?" he asked.

"She's finally woken up from her coma, Mr. Brabant," Cory replied. "I don't think she's in any mood to talk to anyone soon, though."

Brabant waved it off, muttering, "It's all right." He continued to stare at the skyline for a few more moments before finally speaking up. "For more than thirty years, Cash Airlines has operated smoothly and flawlessly," he said. "Now we've finally had a fatal accident. And it's just about a year or so after that thing in San Francisco. We are already under a lot of scrutiny for the two weeks since the crash, and we should all expect that this will only escalate. NTSB's going to leave no stone unturned for their investigation into the crash of Flight 4892. They're going to root out every possible cause of the crash until they find out what really happened."

Brabant then turned around to face the others. He bore a striking resemblance to the actor Hugh Grant, who was probably just a year or two his senior. "Gentlemen," he continued, "what I am about to tell you must not get out of this office. I have a friend who has a friend who has a friend who is deep within the NTSB investigation. And I've heard from this source of mine that they've already managed to narrow it down to two causes by now: pilot error, or air traffic controller error. My contact has also told me that the investigation is already close to downloading the conversations between the pilots and the ATCs, and there are even rumors that there might have been some confusion in the tower because of the numerous flights, and therefore Flight 4892 was not given the landing priority that they had requested due to certain concerns with their fuel."

Brabant then sat down on the high-backed leather chair at the head of the table. "There is a problem from our end, though," he said. "The hospital has just released the results of the blood tests that they've conducted on the members of the crew of Flight 4892. It reveals that two of our employees have had vastly elevated levels of alcohol in their bloodstream, and they've even detected traces of marijuana and cocaine in these employees. Okazaki, the files."

Okazaki, the stewards' union legal representative, took out a large stack of folders from his briefcase and handed them over to Brabant. Cory managed to make out the names on the folders. STEWART; RUSSO; MUNROE; OLIVER; WEASLEY; SIKOWITZ; OSWALD; WEASLEY; CHASE; HARMER; BUNDY; MARONEY. Cory recognized them as the names of the crew of Flight 4892.

Brabant took two of the folders and then held them aloft. "These two people are the ones with the alcohol and drugs in their bloodstreams," he said as he opened the two folders. "They are Senior Air Steward Beck Oliver and Captain Miley Ray Stewart. Now, I could hardly care less about some drunken and drugged steward, but we also have a drunk and drugged pilot on our hands. The airport lawyers are going to have a field day when they find out about this, because this will give them the reason they need to pass the blame to us and instead of their own ATCs. We cannot allow that to happen." Brabant slammed down the folders onto the table, almost in disgust.

"I will not let our airline take the blame for something that may not actually be our fault," he continued. "We need to make sure that the NTSB finds out that the airport is to blame, and not us."

"I know a way."

Eyes turned towards the source of the voice that had just spoken. It was a man who had just entered the conference room, and was standing off to the back, not really involved with the discussion but near enough to hear what they were talking about. "I know a way to make any kind of evidence inadmissible in a court of law," he repeated.

"And who might you be?" Brabant asked him.

"Mr. Brabant," Cory said, walking over to the new arrival, "may I introduce Thomas Bagration, one of the best young criminal defense attorneys in southern California." Cory walked Bagration over to Brabant, and the two men shook hands.

"I've heard your name before, I think," Brabant said. "You were the defense for the killers in the Ganton shootings, yeah?"

"Guilty as charged, Mr. Brabant," Bagration replied.

"So, you know a way to get Captain Stewart's bloodwork dismissed in court?" Brabant asked.

"Sir, blood work is a piece of cake to get junked in court," Bagration replied confidently. "I can even do it in my sleep. The blood was drawn from the patient without her permission. Improper storage of the blood led to fermentation of latent alcohol in the sample. Need I say more?"

Brabant shook his head. "No need, no need," he said. "You can take a seat, if you like, Mister…"

"Bagration."

"Of course." Brabant walked back to the head of the table and said, "We are now in the spotlight of today's news, gentlemen. And it looks like we will be staying there for days to come. We are on every network there is—NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, BBC, and all the other three-letter acronyms out there. But, gentlemen, our main concern is to keep our airline as blemish-free as possible throughout this investigation. Remember, we are not at fault for this crash. But we have to make sure that the NTSB, the government, and the public, knows that."

* * *

A/N: As always, leave behind your thoughts and comments. Tell me if you think it's good or bad! Any reviews are appreciated!


	6. Smoking For the Night

Nobody paid much attention to the short, portly man walking purposefully down the hallways of the hospital, even as he was greeting anyone and everyone that he encountered on his way to his destination. "How ya doing?" he called out jovially to everyone that he met. "I'm just fine, thank you," he replied, even when no one had actually asked him how he was. No one even cared that he was carrying a big backpack, and that whatever was in said backpack was making an awful lot of noise.

Orenthal "Gibby" Gibson had not always been this type of guy. After spending most of his childhood and adolescence in Seattle, he had decided to move to Los Angeles to start a new life, or so he said. After a few incidents with some unsavoury characters that he would as soon want to forget, Gibby became involved in the illegal narcotics trade. He was recruited as a drug dealer by some kind of mysterious group or cartel or something like that, and soon he was selling thousands of dollars' worth of drugs to people in need of a quick fix.

Gibby had then been thrust deep into the heart of Hollywood to sell "quality Mexican" to young starlets and the like after the old dealer had been rounded up by the cops after people began noticing him (a right old man by Hollywood standards) loitering around the homes of the rich and famous. After the old dealer had been nabbed, the leaders of the cartel decided that a younger man such as Gibby would have much more success blending in to the environment to which they were sending him, and it had proved to be a good gamble.

Gibby had made and cultivated good relationships with his clientele, but there were always some customers that he preferred over others. One of those "preferred customers" of his was Miley Ray Stewart, the former Hannah Montana.

Gibby finally found the room where Miley was confined, and he pushed open the door without knocking. "Either I just got very lucky," he said in greeting, "or your family doesn't even care about you anymore."

"Shut up, Gibson," Miley replied. "I called you over as soon as they were all gone. All right, now let's see what you've got."

Gibby shrugged off the pack from his shoulders, laid it down on one of the chairs, and opened it. He took out a bunch of bananas and placed them on the bedside table. "What the hell is that for?" Miley asked.

"It's fruit," Gibby replied as he revealed a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from underneath the bananas. "Fruit's mandatory on a hospital visit. You should be watching TV more often."

"Thanks but no thanks," Miley said. "Everything on the TV right now is about the crash. And thanks for the smokes, man. You are a lifesaver!"

"Oh, wait. There's more." Gibby dug deeper into his pack and brought out a small cylinder wrapped in foil labelled COOKIE DOUGH. "I got this from your apartment just like you asked me," he said. "I don't want to know whatever's inside that thing. I didn't look, and therefore I am not curious."

"Yeah, right," Miley muttered, putting away the "cookie dough."

"And I also got you this," Gibby said, pulling out a big square package wrapped in brown paper from his bag. "How did that even fit in there?" Miley asked, but Gibby didn't bother to reply to that. Instead, he said, "It's something to keep you entertained while you're here."

"Is this what I think it is?" Miley asked, shaking the package. "In more ways than one," Gibby replied.

Finally, Gibby took one more item from his bag. "This is what you've been wanting from me ever since you got back," he said. It was a large, plastic box with what appeared to be brownies.

"How many in there?" Miley asked. "Enough to last until they cure glaucoma," Gibby replied. "Anyway, that should be all that you need from me. If you need any more, you know where to find me."

"Thanks, Gibby," Miley replied. "You're a real friend."

* * *

It was already midnight, and yet Miley Stewart still could not command her body to sleep. Her family and friends had come back just as soon as Gibby had gone out of her room, although none of them seemed to have noticed that she had had a visitor in the interim.

Miley's friend Lilly Truscott had stayed behind after the others had left to return to their homes so she could help Miley catch up with what had happened to the rest of the world after the crash of Flight 4892. As it turned out, nothing very important had happened in the intervening period, only that Germany had won the FIFA World Cup, and on their way to the trophy, they had absolutely demolished Brazil 7-1 in the semifinals.

Lilly had fallen asleep a long time ago, and her loud snoring was only part of the problem why Miley couldn't sleep. The main reason for that was that every time she closed her eyes, the final events of Flight 4892 kept playing over and over in her mind's eye. It was an almost never-ending cycle that eventually ended up with her not having fallen asleep even when it was already midnight and beyond that. Once she saw that it was already a few minutes past midnight, Miley decided that there was only one solution to her problem now.

Miley sat up on the bed and swung her legs over to the floor. The tiles felt cold to her feet, but she had no choice but to carry on because if she wanted to sleep, she had to do what she was planning to do. The catheter had long since been removed once she woke up, but she was still hooked up to the IV drip, so she had to take it along with her. Luckily, it was on a movable stand designed especially for moments like this, so all she had to do was take the IV along with her, and she was out of the room.

The hospital hallways were dim, with lights on only at alternating intervals. Apparently even hospitals could find ways of being cheap, Miley thought to herself. But they certainly didn't turn off the air conditioning, because she could feel the absolutely freezing wind running up and down her back and backside, because the hospital gown that she was wearing was the type that was tied off at the back only with a few strings.

Miley found an emergency exit near her room. She looked around to make sure no one was around, and then she opened the door and slipped into the emergency stairs. She sat down on the cold concrete floor and took out the pack of cigarettes that Gibby had hidden underneath the bananas, shook out a stick and lit it with the accompanying lighter. Miley stuck the cigarette in her mouth, leaned back her head, and took a deep breath. She felt the familiar rush of nicotine flooding her system, and she sighed, blowing smoke high into the air.

Miley was halfway through her first cigarette and was blowing smoke rings up at the ceiling when the emergency exit door opened, and a familiar mop of bright red hair popped in. "Miley! I didn't know you smoked," the redhead said.

"You never asked me in the first place, Ron," Miley replied.

Ron Weasley went into the stairwell and sat down beside Miley. "Is there any more where that came from?" he asked, indicating the cigarette.

"Just opened it myself," Miley replied, holding out the pack. Ron took out a stick, which he lit with Miley's lighter. "Ah, that feels good," he muttered as soon as he took a drag. "Thanks for this one, mate."

"No problem, man," Miley replied. "Hey, Ron?"

"Yes?"

"What was it like for you? The crash, I mean?"

"Right, the crash," Ron muttered. Smoke poured out from his nostrils as he pondered the question. "Well, it was definitely scary, there's no denying that," he finally replied. "I definitely thought I was going to die when it happened."

"Tell me about it," Miley said. "What about Beck, though? Did you see what happened to him? I mean, I've heard the rumors, but do you know what really happened?"

"Are you kidding me?" Ron asked in reply. "Once you see something like that, you can't un-see it. You can wish, you can forget, but sometimes it pops just right back in there in your mind's eye, and before you know it, it's already morning, and you haven't even slept a wink."

"So you're saying that it's true? Beck doesn't have half a head anymore?"

"You're better off not knowing the whole truth, Miles. Believe me on that."

Right at that moment, the emergency exit door opened once again, and this time two people, a man and a woman, went in. "Oh, sweet niblets!" Miley exclaimed. "What is this, a smoker's convention?"

"Don't blame me," Erwin Sikowitz said. "Ron's the one who texted us about the smokes."

"Guilty as charged," Ron said, raising his hands in mock surrender.

"So, are you guys talking about anything in particular or are you just smoking in private?" Annabeth Chase asked, but not before Miley had already distributed more cigarettes among them.

"We were just talking about the crash, actually," Ron replied. "And Beck, of course."

"It's such a shame about Beck," Sikowitz said. "I've known that kid ever since he joined Cash. You could say that I was his mentor while he was still moving up the ranks, or something like that. He was a fast learner: teach him anything one time, and he'll know it till kingdom come. Actually, a few weeks ago, he told me that he was actually planning to finally make the move from the cabin to the cockpit."

"Knowing him, I think he would have made a pretty damned fine pilot," Ron said. "Such a shame that he had to go the way he went."

"Look, Ron, I know you said to me that I'm better off not knowing, but I really want to know," Miley said. "So please, will you tell me?"

Ron, Sikowitz, and Annabeth looked at each other, as if trying to get a consensus of opinion. Finally, Sikowitz was the one to make the first move. "When you turned on the FASTEN SEATBELTS sign, Miles, we all followed," he said. "But then, when the plane went a little bit lower, Ginny—Ron's sister, if you remember her—saw that this baby or little kid or whatever had slipped out of her seat, and so she unbuckled and helped the kid get back. Then the angle of descent got steeper, and Ginny realized that she wouldn't be able to get back to her seat now, so Beck, always the guy that helps out, got out of _his_ seat and against all odds managed to get Ginny back safe. And then, just before he could sit down… crash." Sikowitz slapped his palm on the back of his other hand for emphasis.

"We had a hard time getting the passengers to evacuate because they didn't want to go down the aisle where Beck went down," Ron added. "Annabeth and I were there when the paramedics finally pulled him out of the wreck. They'd already covered his body for the purposes of decency, but you could tell that the top of his head was just gone. During the crash, I remember clearly seeing some of the debris flying towards him, and then he was down. I thought I even saw his brain for a moment." Ron took a long drag from his cigarette, hoping that the tar and nicotine could help him force down the bile creeping up his throat.

"Jade was there when they finally brought Beck to the morgue," Annabeth said. "She was absolutely hysterical from crying. It took ten guys just to finally pry her away from the body. God, it was such a sad and sorry sight. Even I feel like crying when I remember it."

"Oh, God," Miley muttered. "It's all my fault. I shouldn't have flown while I was still recovering from that hangover."

"Hey, Miley," Ron said, "if there's one thing that we know is true, it's that you're not at fault for this. Beck would have told you to stop blaming yourself for it, for him, for all the others that died. You had no way of knowing that that was what was going to happen when you made the decision to land, and there is nothing you could do to change that. Besides, when you think about it, maybe it was Beck's time. He was a good person. And you know what they say about good people: they're too good for this world."

"Maybe," Miley muttered, but her soul still felt heavy with the guilt of being at least part of the reason why 48 people were no longer alive. Eventually all of them fell silent, with only the occasional breath from dragging a cigarette breaking the silence. One by one, they slipped out of the emergency exit, with Miley being the last to come out, with gum in her mouth to disguise the nicotine in her breath, and her IV stand still dragging along behind her.

Lilly was still sound asleep when Miley got back to her room. Miley carefully hid the cigarettes and lighter from view, slipped back into bed, and closed her eyes in one last attempt to finally fall asleep. This time, when she closed her eyes, she saw the crash as it happened from with the cabin, and the last thing that she remembered seeing was a large jagged piece of metal flying towards her before she finally fell into blissful sleep.

* * *

A/N: As always, if you want to say anything about the story, leave a review!

GR


	7. Return to Malibu

It had taken him the better part of a day, but the hospital had finally been convinced by the legal representative of the Cash Airlines Pilots' Union that one of its patients, Miley Ray Stewart, was finally well enough to be released by the hospital to the care of her family.

Miley, now dressed in a white shirt, blue jeans, and a comfortable pair of sandals that Lilly had brought over the night before, had just finished paying the bills, and was walking out of the hospital when she was met by the legal representative of the pilots' union himself, Cory Baxter.

"Cory!" Miley said in surprise. "What are you doing here? And where's Dad?"

"Your father called me and asked if I could pick you up," Cory replied. "He said he had an unexpected errand to run; that's why he's not here right now."

"It's probably to bail Jackson out of prison again," Miley sneered.

"Hey, Miles, don't talk about your brother like that," Cory warned her. "It could very well be your ass that ends up in jail. A lot of people are calling for your arrest ever since someone let leak that Tommy Bagration was trying to get your blood inadmissible as court evidence."

"My blood, huh?" Miley went silent as the two of them walked over to Cory's car.

"Yes, your blood," Cory replied. "Good God, Miley, what were you thinking? First you went and had sex with Beck—while under the influence of alcohol and drugs, might I add—and then you reported to the cockpit while you're still hung-over, and quite probably still a bit high. It's a good thing we got you and Beck and the drugs out of the papers, but I still gotta ask the question, Miles. Why?"

"What can I say?" Miley stammered. "We lost to Belgium. Emotions were high. We couldn't help ourselves."

"Unbelievable."

Miley and Cory finally arrived at Cory's car. "There we are," Cory said. "You can put your bags in the back if you like."

"What the heck is this, Cory?" Miley asked, staring dumbfounded at the car.

"It's my car," Cory replied. "What's wrong with it?"

"What's wrong with it?" Miley repeated. "It's a freaking Declasse Voodoo, man! Did you know, Cory, that everyone who sees someone driving a Voodoo automatically thinks that the driver is an onanist?"

"So what?" Cory said. "I've always wanted a Voodoo ever since I first saw one when I was a kid. Besides, my CLK and my Rolls-Royce are in the shop at the moment, so it's literally the only car that I have right now. And why would I care if someone thought I was an onanist? The nerve of those people!" Cory took out his phone and began scrolling through something on the screen.

"O-N-A-N-I-S-T," Miley spelled out.

"Thanks, girl," Cory muttered. He finally stopped scrolling, and then his eyes widened as he understood what Miley had just called him. "I do not use coitus interruptus!" he said angrily. "Why would I deny my seed to the women of the world?"

"Of course you wouldn't, Cory," Miley said. "I know that. But do the people that see you driving the Voodoo know that?"

Cory sighed. "You got a point, Miles," he said. "Come on, let's get this over and done with. Thanks for ruining my good mood today, Miles."

"My pleasure, Mr. Baxter," Miley replied in a fake British accent. Cory turned on the car, and he backed out of the parking lot and onto the road.

"Mind if I turn on the radio?" Miley asked.

"Sure, go ahead."

Miley turned on the radio. It was tuned to a news station, and the blaring tune that announced the coming of breaking news was playing. Finally, a human voice spoke up and said, "Yet another Malaysia Airlines jet has fallen from the skies, and this time there's no doubt as to where it has gone down. Recent reports say that Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, has been shot down by what appears to be pro-Russian separatists operating within eastern Ukraine. All 298 passengers and crew onboard are believed dead. This tragedy comes just five months after the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, and almost two and a half weeks after the crash of Cash Airlines Flight 4892 right here in Los Angeles."

"There goes another one," Cory said in reaction to the news. "2014 is not looking like a good year for the aviation industry, is it? Yeah, that's gonna cost the airlines money."

"Why does everything always have to be about money for you, Cory?" Miley asked. She shook her head and said, "I can't listen to this. I've had enough of air crashes for now." With that said, she tuned the radio to another station, this one playing some kind of pop-rock music.

"So, back to your place?" Cory asked.

"No, I was thinking about going back to Malibu, actually," Miley replied.

"Are you serious?"

"Yeah, Cory, I'm serious. I wanna go to Malibu, and not my apartment."

"Any reason for it?"

"Nothing much, except that I think it's time that I got back in touch with my family."

"Yeah, I think you're right, Miles. You really should be trying to get back with them."

Miley's separation from her family, while not being an actual rift, had grown some through the years after her decision to quit showbiz and become a pilot. But while the root of it may have been personal, Miley's work as a pilot for Cash had also given her its fair share of problems. The long hours, oft-irregular schedules, shifting time differences, and quite possibly a lot of unspoken thoughts and problems had added up into something that had kept Miley from keeping in regular contact with her family and friends, and soon it had felt like her life was now divided into two distinct periods: the Hannah Montana period, and the Cash Airlines period.

Miley and Cory spent the rest of the drive in silence, thinking their own thoughts while soft music played from the radio. Finally, Cory made what could quite possibly be an illegal U-turn, and he parked the Voodoo beside the driveway of a large house. "We're here," he said.

Miley looked up at the house that had been her home for three or four years; the best and worst three to four years of her life. It was during those four years that Hannah Montana reached the peak of her career. It was also during those four years that Miley Stewart had found true love, or so she thought. On the other hand, it was also the time when Miley had started to grow tired of living the double life due to a combination of rapidly approaching college life and what Miley had called "stage fatigue." Eventually, Miley decided that she had had enough with fame, and she made the decision to become an airline pilot instead. Once she had been hired by Cash Airlines, she had bought an apartment closer to the airport and then moved out of the house. In her mind, it was also a metaphor for her moving away from Hannah Montana into Captain Miley Stewart.

"Hey, Miley!" Cory shouted, bringing Miley back to the present. "Are you gonna keep staring at your house like that or are you gonna actually go there?"

"Piss off, Baxter, I'm reminiscing here." But Miley still walked up the steps to the house and rang the doorbell. Almost immediately, it opened, and behind it stood Jackson Stewart, Miley's brother. "Miley," he said. "It's been quite a while since you last dropped by."

"Yeah, well, I decided to drop by because I've got nothing else to do at the moment," Miley replied. "So, did Dad have to bail you out once again for breaking yet another restraining order or what?"

"You're one to talk about jail, Miles," Jackson said. "Back when we were still living in Tennessee, you hid in the trunk of Uncle Earl's car and almost scared off the sheriff's deputy when you pointed a gun at him."

"That was an accident, Jackson! When I saw the sheriff's car coming, I jumped into the trunk, and then I felt one of Uncle Earl's guns poking my ribs, so I tried to move it away, but then my finger got caught in the trigger, and then the deputy opened the trunk, and I almost pulled the trigger at him! Man, we were both lucky to be alive then!"

"Yeah, right, Miles, your finger got caught in the trigger…"

"Jackson!" a voice shouted from deep within the house. "Who's that at the door?"

"It's Miley, Dad!" Jackson replied. "Her and the airline lawyer."

Robbie Ray Stewart, Miley and Jackson's father, walked over to the front door. "Jackson, why don't you go on over to the kitchen?" he said. "I'm cooking something over there."

"Sure thing, Dad," Jackson said, knowing that his father and his sister would need to have some time alone to talk.

"Here's Miley, Mr. Stewart," Cory told Robbie Ray. "Safe and sound, just like you asked me."

"So she is," Robbie Ray muttered.

"I better go, sir," Cory said. "I think you two need some time to talk." With that said, Cory backed out of the front porch and began walking back to his car. Midway down, he took out his cellphone from his pocket and answered a call.

"Miley, it _has_ been a long time since you were last here," Robbie Ray told his daughter once Cory was out of earshot.

Miley sighed. "I know, Dad," she said. "Look, I'm not gonna sugarcoat what I'm about to say because you deserve to know the truth. It's my fault that I grew distant with you and Jackson and Lilly and all my other friends. I'd grown tired of being Hannah Montana; grew tired of living two lives at the same time. Whenever I would think about you, or Jackson, or Lilly or the others, I would always remember Hannah alongside. And I didn't want to live like that anymore, so I moved out and became a pilot. I was kinda hoping that it was gonna be a new chapter of my life, so to speak. And then the crash happened, and that got me thinking about how I've never said any proper goodbyes, and that in all the time that I've been flying for Cash, I've missed you guys. I would never have forgiven myself if I'd died before I'd reconciled with y'all."

"Is that an apology, Miley?" Rarely did his daughter ever apologize for a lot of things since the day she was born, but Robbie Ray recognized that something special or strange was going on right now.

"Yeah, Dad," Miley replied. "I may have said a lot of words, but yeah, I'm saying sorry for leaving y'all behind all those years ago."

Robbie Ray sighed. "Well, I suppose I'm also at fault for what happened," he said. "I had no idea that you hated being Hannah."

"Oh, no, Dad, you got it wrong," Miley said. "It's not that I hate Hannah, it's just that… I thought I needed a new challenge. Somehow, I managed to master living two lives. At that point, I guess I just wanted to be my own person, not just someone whom someone wanted me to be."

"It's not really what I was expecting you to say," Robbie Ray said, "but at least you finally allowed me to understand where you're coming from." He hugged his daughter. "Welcome back, Miley Ray Stewart."

"It's good to be back, Dad," Miley replied. "How about my room, though? Is it still around?"

"She's been waiting for you for four years," Robbie Ray replied.

Just as Miley was about to enter the house, Cory walked up to her and tapped her shoulder lightly. "The NTSB's just called me," he said. "Their lead investigator in the crash wants to talk to you."

"What, as in like, right now?" Miley asked. "Can't you just have him move the date or something?"

"Actually, _she_ wants to talk to you now, as in right now, when your memories of the crash are still fresh," Cory replied. "At least that's what she said. Also, she wants to meet with you at the crash site."

"Oh, sweet niblets," Miley muttered. "All right, just let me get my things stashed, and then let's go meet this girl."

"Hey, if you guys make it back before six," Robbie Ray said, "I've got pot roast for dinner. Just so you know. If you're interested."

"I'll keep that in mind, Mr. Stewart," Cory said.

* * *

A/N: As always, leave a review whether you liked it or not! - GR


	8. Interview

"So, Cory, do you happen to know anything about this hotshot NTSB lead investigator?"

"I know _of_ her," Cory Baxter replied as he drove Miley Stewart from her family house in Malibu back to Los Angeles International Airport, and the crash site of Cash Airlines Flight 4892. "Her name's Evans or something like that. Rumor has it that she was either once a wannabe actress, or she was already a small-time Broadway player before suddenly deciding that she actually wanted to know why planes went down and stuff like that. I'm not really sure about that, though? Have you heard of an actress named Evans who suddenly went out of the limelight?"

"A few people come to mind," Miley replied. "But I'm pretty sure that none of them are the one we're talking about right now. Some of them are so shallow, they can't think of anything else other than themselves."

"That was a bit harsh," Cory said. "Nobody could possibly be that shallow."

"You probably haven't met some of the actresses _I've_ met, Cory," Miley said.

"Heads up, we're here," Cory said as he drove his car onto a field that had been converted, temporarily, into a parking lot. Most of the cars in the field were generic government cars like Ford sedans and Chevy vans. Cory's purple Voodoo was a great big spot of individuality amongst the seething mass of bureaucracy around them. Cory and Miley got out of the car and began walking towards the crash site, which was cordoned off from the public with yellow tape.

This was the first time that Miley had seen the crash site in person, and deep inside her she wondered how 328 people, herself included, had managed to survive it. The Boeing 747 appeared to have struck the ground at a very shallow angle. The tail had struck the ground first, followed by the left wing. The impact appeared to have torn off both parts of the plane, and led to the front part of the plane—the one with the cockpit and the 747's distinctive hump—corkscrewing violently and shearing off the other wing. The right wing struck the fuselage, and it was what had caused most of the casualties of the crash.

"My God," Miley muttered. "How did we survive that?"

"Well, I can't really say anything about that, since the investigation has only just begun," Cory replied.

Miley scoffed and walked away from Cory and towards the crash site. There she was met by a man with very bushy eyebrows wearing a jacket with NTSB in big yellow letters on the back over his suit. "I'm looking for the lead investigator," she told him.

"And who might you be?" he asked.

"I'm the captain, er, I _was_ the captain of this plane."

"Oh. She's over by the cockpit." He pointed at the wreckage in question, even though Miley could plainly see it.

Miley walked over to the remains of the cockpit, where a blonde-haired woman wearing an NTSB jacket over her pantsuit was watching two men, also wearing NTSB jackets, poring over the cockpit instruments. She turned around when she heard footsteps behind her and asked, "Are you Captain Stewart?"

"Yeah," Miley replied. "At least I think I am."

"Sharon Evans," the blonde said, offering her hand. Miley took it, but as they shook hands, Evans gave Miley a closer look. "Have we met before?" she asked.

"I don't think so," Miley said. "I would remember meeting someone like you, because you've got hair as blindingly blonde as my friend Lilly's."

"I'll take that as a compliment," Evans said. "I'm sure you're aware of how we investigators want to talk to survivors of plane crashes, especially the flight crew—which means you—while the memories are still fresh in your mind. I want to know about everything that went on inside the cockpit from the moment you took off from Sao Paulo to the crash. Is that okay?"

"I don't know," Miley admitted. "I was in a coma for like fourteen days. I'm not sure if I'll be able to remember anything important for your investigation."

"Anything that you can tell us counts in the long run, Captain," Evans replied. "Shall we do this?"

"All right, I guess so."

"Okay. Would you mind if we did it in that tent?" Evans pointed at a small white tent erected just a couple of yards away from the wreckage of the cockpit. Miley suspected that the investigators used it as an office of some kind or other.

"Not at all," she said, and Evans led her inside. There were some tables and folding metal chairs inside the tent. Most of the tables were groaning under the weight of stacks upon stacks of paperwork, but there was also one table or two that had bits of wreckage that were considered important by the investigators, such as cockpit instruments that had been removed from the wreck and pieces of fuselage and engine. Evans cleared away some papers from a table at the very back of the tent, and she indicated to Miley to sit down on the chair in front of it.

"All right, captain, would you mind if we started from the very beginning?" Evans asked. When Miley shook her head, she continued, "Can you describe to me the takeoff?"

"We took off sometime after midnight," Miley said. "There was a small delay—not too much, just maybe three to five minutes—because the flight engineer that was supposed to be with us went down with some kind of disease that meant that we had to find another engineer."

"I see," Evans said, nodding her head as she began writing down notes. "What about this replacement flight engineer? How did you take to him?"

"Who, Sonny? I've worked with _her_ on a couple dozen flights already. _She_ knows her stuff. I actually think that she deserves at least one more stripe on her shoulders, but my mouth's just run off again. We're still talking about the crash, right?"

"Don't worry about that, Captain Stewart," Evans muttered, writing down more notes. "Now, how was the takeoff itself? Did you notice anything odd with your aircraft during takeoff or something along those lines?"

"I didn't notice anything odd, no," Miley replied, shaking her head. "Although to be honest, I don't remember much of what had happened then, because it seemed like just any other takeoff I've done. Well, sure, there was this one thing, but it wasn't even related to this."

"And what was that?"

"It's actually nothing, just something that popped up in our minds while we were waiting for the guys ahead of us to take off. It was a Varig 737 ahead of us, and then one of us had this crazy idea that if we were to somehow accidentally run over those guys, there would be little if anything left of them. Like I said, it was a crazy thought, but nothing related to the, uh, accident itself."

"Mm-hmm," Evans muttered, pen streaking long lines down the paper. "What about the flight itself?"

"You should probably ask the relief crew about that," Miley said. "They were the ones that flew the plane for the majority of the flight. Me, Alex and Sonny were only for the takeoff and landings since it was midnight when we took off."

"I see." Evans finally stopped writing and put down her pen and papers. "What about the landing?"

"What about the landing?" Miley repeated. "Well, to put a word on it, it was screwed up. First, there was a lot of shit going on in LAX, and the tower said that it could be down to anything from a riot to an earthquake. You know how California is. But we didn't mind that. We've all had our fair share of unexpected delays, and we thought that it was just gonna be one of those days.

"Things started to fall apart when this rainstorm came in over LAX and about an hour after we got into the holding pattern. When we entered the pattern, we were told that we were number fifteen to land. But then some other controller, not the first guy we talked to, came on and said that we had been bumped to number sixteen. We weren't pleased with that. _I _wasn't pleased with it. I was considering faking an emergency to get priority but then suddenly Sonny told us that our fuel was getting low. But then she also told us that the instruments were telling her that we had less fuel than we should, so then it was either we didn't have enough fuel, or the fuel gauges were malfunctioning. Either way, we got an actual emergency just as I was thinking about faking one."

"Wait a minute," Evans said, raising her hand. "You were saying that your flight engineer told you that you didn't have enough fuel, or did she say that your instruments were not working properly?"

"She said both, actually," Miley said. "First, Sonny said that we didn't have enough fuel. Then she did some maths and determined that it had to be the instruments that were faulty because they were saying that we only had ten minutes of fuel left when we should still have fifteen to twenty minutes. It's very confusing, really."

"I'll take your word for it, Captain," Evans said. "What happened just as you were about to land, captain? It looked like you were just about to make the runway before you crashed? Any explanation or thoughts about that?"

"I think it's strange, but not unexplainable-strange, if you know what I mean," Miley replied. "But there was something then that I still can't stop thinking about even until now. Just before we crashed, the engines all went quiet. That would mean that we really didn't have enough fuel to make it. But then even though we didn't have any fuel left, we should have been able to glide to the runway without any problem. Why did we end up crashing? I'm sorry if I sound like I'm rambling, but I really just can't get my mind off of those things."

"Interesting," the investigator muttered, writing furiously on her notebook once again. "Thank you for all of your answers, Captain Stewart. That will be all for now, but we will be wanting to talk to you once again in the next few days. I recommend not going out of town for the next few days, captain." Evans then shook Miley's hand, and then she led her out of the tent and back to the parking lot beside the crash site.

"So, how did it go?" Cory asked her as she walked back to where he had parked his car.

"Honestly?" Miley replied. "I don't know what to think or what to say."

"Well, what _is_ there to say anyway?" Cory asked rhetorically. "She asked you questions, and you answered them. You _did_ answer them, right?"

Miley shrugged off Cory's dig as they walked back to his car. As she got in, she said," You know, I think I have heard of Sharon Evans before, but last time I sort of met her, her name was Sharpay, not Sharon. Probably a stage name, and then when she went to the NTSB she decided to use her real name. I don't know for sure, though."

"I thought you would recognize her when you met her," Cory said as he drove out of the field-turned-parking lot. "Oh, and Beck's funeral is on Friday afternoon. Are you gonna come?"

"I don't know, Cory, I haven't decided yet," Miley admitted.

"Well, you should. It's probably the best thing that you can do for him now. Also, Alex and her brother are coming to Beck's funeral, and I'm going to pick them up from the hospital because that's also when Alex will finally be discharged. I know you don't got any wheels at the moment, so if you change your mind and want to come, you may want to carpool with us."

"I'll keep that in mind," Miley said. But deep inside, she knew that she would probably never be able to summon the courage to go to Beck Oliver's funeral. Not after what had happened to them all those days ago in Brazil, back when their biggest problem was bringing home hundreds of disappointed American soccer fans. And she also dreaded the possibility of meeting with Jade, Beck's girlfriend and practically common-law wife. Miley didn't even know if she had a face to show at the funeral.

The thoughts raced quickly through her mind, and she didn't know what to think of the various strands of thought drifting through her consciousness at that moment.

* * *

A/N: As always, dear readers, leave a review, a like or a favourite whether you like my story or not! - GR


	9. Always Faithful

"Hello?" Miley said as she knocked on the door of the hospital room. "Anyone in here?" When no one replied, she decided to open the door on her own.

"Hey, I thought I clearly said that we were not to be disturbed!"

Miley entered the hospital room to find Alex Russo sitting at the foot of the hospital bed. A large wad of gauze covered her left eye, and a band of medical tape wound its way around her head to keep the makeshift eyepatch in place. Behind her stood her brother Justin, dressed in the iconic white dress uniform of the United States Navy. Miley remembered someone telling her that Justin Russo had just completed his first tour of duty as a submariner, and she could see the submarine service's "dolphins" prominent on Justin's left breast.

"My God, Alex, what happened to your eye?" Miley blurted out.

"Good morning to you too, Miley," Alex replied, a little sarcastically. "I'm doing fine, thank you. As for my eye... My head smacked the yoke hard during the crash. I lost all vision in my left eye, but the doctors say it should return in a few days. Three weeks later, and I'm still waiting too see something with that eye."

"Maybe you should try taking off that eyepatch of yours," Miley said.

"Don't you think I haven't tried that yet?" Alex replied. "All I can see out of it right now is something gray and blurry."

"At least you're alive, Alex," Justin said. "And that's what matters."

"Listen to your brother, Alex," Miley said. "Also, Justin, how is it that you're here?"

"Oh, my sub's just docked over in San Diego," Justin replied. "And we arrived just as your plane crashed. My sister's lucky to be alive."

"Yeah, sorry about that," Miley said.

"That wasn't criticism on your part, Miles, it was a compliment," Justin said. "My sister, and everyone else onboard that plane are all honestly lucky that they made it out alive. And it's all thanks to you, Miley."

"I still didn't manage to save 48 of them, though."

"Hey, Miley, don't waste any sleep on those 48 people," Alex said. "If it was their time, then it was their time."

"That's quite dark," Miley quipped. "Even for you, Alex."

Justin's cellphone rang. "It's Cory," he said as he read the message on it. "He's here."

As the three of them picked up their things and headed out for the hospital's parking lot, Miley asked Alex, "Where's the funeral going to be?"

"Some kind of Roman Catholic church over in Filipinotown," Alex replied.

"Filipinotown?" Miley repeated.

"Yeah," Alex said. "I think it's obvious why it's called that."

"No shit, Alex," Miley said. "Wait a minute, Filipinotown? A Roman Catholic church? I thought Beck was American or Canadian or at least Caucasian? He's certainly not Filipino, unless there's something he hasn't told us."

"Oh, don't lose any sleep over it, Miles," Alex said. "You know Beck, girl. He likes to do lots of charitable stuff for communities and all that."

"Well, that certainly fits Beck to a T," Miley said. "But you gotta wonder why he wanted to be buried where he wants to be buried."

"Ours not to reason why, Miley," Alex said.

Miley, Alex and Justin went into Cory's car—still the Voodoo, Miley noted with a little exasperation—and the Cash Airlines legal representative drove them over to their destination. While they drove, Cory and Justin began talking about their respective careers, with Cory boasting a little about being the richest man in Cash, second only to owner Cabu Dobson himself. Justin meanwhile talked about his tour of duty on his submarine, or at least the aspects of it that he could discuss in public. Alex tried to get Miley to talk, but the latter had become deep in thought, and Alex knew when someone didn't want to talk, so they both kept to themselves during the drive, but Alex did occasionally talk with the boys when she felt that they needed a feminine perspective.

The church in Filipinotown was small, barely large enough for a hundred people, and could probably be called a chapel without taking anything away from it. It looked recently built, because its sky blue and white paint looked like they had been applied just days ago. The community was very open and inviting to newcomers and visitors, something that Miley had noticed as soon as they had arrived. It was a very tightly-knit community, Filipinotown, but it was one that was quite open in the inclusion of new members into their group.

Miley had never really been a religious person. She knew that her family regularly went to church back when she was still young and they were still living in Tennessee. She couldn't remember exactly what kind of church they had gone to, though. Maybe it was Wesleyan, Southern Baptist, Presbyterian or even Seventh-Day Adventist, but she was certain that it was a Protestant church. Miley had never really liked going to church, seeing it as something that had to be done because her parents had told her so since she was a child. Also, when there were times that she had tried to return to the faith, all the preachers had been too preachy about sin, how it tainted everyone on Earth and how only blind obedience to the words of the Bible could free anyone who believed in God's Word from the all-pervading sin of man. That was one aspect of the faith that had kept Miley from coming back into the fold willingly.

Here among the Filipinos, it was a different story altogether. Their view of God was a forgiving God, one that would never tire of forgiving His children no matter what their sins were as long as they were truly repentant for their actions. They believed that everyone was welcome to come into the Kingdom of God, even those who were not part of His church. For them, living the virtuous life of a Christian, even if one happened to worship Allah, Buddha or even Zeus, was enough to attain the reward of eternal life.

Mass finally began at two in the afternoon. Beck's coffin lay at the foot of the altar. Family and friends of the deceased sat at the front rows of pews, followed by acquaintances in the middle. The last rows were reserved for stragglers and the curious.

Miley, Alex, Justin and Cory were seated on the third row of pews. Fellow Cash Airlines personnel (pilots and cabin and ground crews), some of them who had been onboard Flight 4892, were seated with them. Up front, in the very first row of pews, were Beck's family and closest friends. Erwin Sikowitz was with them, but Miley couldn't remember the rest of Beck's friends' names. Their names were the kind that only an idiot could forget, but as that thought ran through her mind she began remembering names like Tori, Cat, Andre and Robbie, and there was also that guy with the weird name like Schengen or Shenzhen or something like that.

But Miley surely remembered the name Jade West, and the face and person that came along with it. Jade was dressed all in black today, and she could easily be mistaken for Beck's widow. In a way, she was. Everyone—at least everyone in Cash—knew that Beck and Jade were common-law-married, which suited both of them just fine. They had plans to make their marriage official, sure, but with Beck now in a wooden box at the foot of an altar, there was little chance of that happening now. Their relationship was a one-in-a-billion thing: their love was as strong as that of a couple who had been together for fifty years. Sometimes their love had even eclipsed that comparison.

Thinking about Beck and Jade's relationship made Miley feel like a whore in church. She and Beck had knowingly engaged in adulterous activities despite both of them knowing that Beck was in common-law marriage with Jade. Miley had no idea if Jade suspected anything, but a part of her felt as if she deserved to know the truth, even though Jade's temper was legend in the halls of Cash Airlines.

The priest's homily was short and concise, unlike some other pastors that Miley remembered from her old church, whose sermons could often go on for hours and even ended up in some very sharp tangents. This priest meanwhile managed to connect Beck's life with the gospel, and he was all praises for the things that Beck had done for the community before his untimely death. It was a very far cry from the sermons from Miley's old church, whose preachers could every microscopic trace of sin on any person while ignoring every good thing that that person had done in his or her life. And while the Catholic priest did say that Beck was as sinful as every person on Earth, that part of him should not be part of the memory of the man that was Beck Oliver.

Once the Mass was over, four pallbearers, all of them friends of Beck, carried his coffin from the church to the graveyard behind it. A plot had already been excavated, prepared to receive Beck into the warm and eternal embrace of the earth. The bereaved were given one last chance to gaze upon the deceased, and then the coffin was finally lowered into the ground. The women, especially Jade, practically wailed at the sight of the coffin being lowered into the ground. Even the men couldn't help but shed some of their own tears. Out of the corners of Miley's tearful eyes, she saw Cory sniff and dab a hankerchief over his eyes.

Once the final clod of soil had been laid on the tomb, the bereaved began to file out of the cemetery by themselves or in pairs or in small groups. Miley gathered up her courage, took a deep breath, and began walking towards Jade, telling Alex, Justin and Cory that she had something to take care of before heading onward. As she drew closer, Miley could finally see why Beck had fallen absolutely in love with her. Jade's eyes were a shade of blue-green that was so alluring that even the straightest of women could feel the subtle tugs of homosexuality just by looking at them. Jade also had a way with her hair and highlights that was just so sensually appealing to both men and women. Beck had described Jade so many times during his time in Cash that Miley could recite it all verbatim, but now, seeing Jade in person, she finally understood why Jade West had singlehandedly captured Beck Oliver's heart.

"Jade West?"

"Yes?" Jade replied. "Who's asking?" she continued as she turned to face Miley.

"I'm, uh, Miley Stewart, the—"

"The captain on Beck's last flight," Jade continued. "Yeah, I know. I heard about you in the news."

"Look, Jade, I know that this probably won't be enough, but I wanted to offer my condolences to you and your family."

"It's okay. Thank you for that." Jade dabbed at the tears welling up in the corners of her eyes once again as she said that.

"Do you mind if we take a walk?" Miley asked.

Miley and Jade began walking down the path leading to the street. As they walked, Jade said, "Weren't you some kind of star or something?"

"I knew that was gonna come up sooner or later," Miley muttered. Then, to Jade, she said, "Yeah, I was a pop star some years ago. Then I left it because I had enough of that life. How about you, Jade? I heard from Beck that you were now an actress or a director or something like that."

"I'm more of a writer-slash-producer actually," Jade replied. "I was involved in a slasher film or two a few years back, and I just wrapped up my first mystery thriller film. Can't tell you anything much more than that, except that it's gonna hit the theaters sometime in January or February next year."

"Anyway, Jade, about the crash..." Miley trailed off. This was the part where she found it very difficult to speak. She never was the most truthful of people, and living a double life as Hannah Montana had affected her ability to tell the truth to other people. "There was something that Beck did the night before we took off from Sao Paulo."

"Okay," Jade muttered. They were just about to step out of the cemetery and onto the street.

"Uh, Jade, Beck and I... well, we fooled around before we took off. Listen, I didn't try to force him into it or anything. It just happened. The alcohol and the drugs may have had something to do with it."

Jade then did something that surprised Miley very much. She stopped at the gate to the cemetery and let out a laugh that sounded relieved. "I thought as much," she said.

"Wait, you suspected that Beck and I had a one-night stand?" Miley asked Jade with genuine surprise.

"Well, if you keep a tight leash on your man like I do, you expect him to let loose when he's out of your sight," Jade replied matter-of-factly. "He's a man, Miley; it's what they do. And don't look so scared that I know about it. It's not like I'm gonna kill you in your sleep later tonight." Jade said that with a laugh, but Miley couldn't help but feel a small chill travel down her spine even as she forced a laugh out of her lungs.

"Look, Miley, you and Beck had sex the day before you took off," Jade said. "Any other woman would probably be enraged by that, and I am a bit mad at both you and him for that, but I've managed to rein in my temper in the last few months. But I can't stay mad at him because I know that if he was still alive, he wouldn't have left me. He's a keeper, Beck Oliver. He's absolutely loyal to the girl he loves, and he won't leave her even if he happened to fuck some other woman while he was off in another country."

"Jade, I am so sorry for what happened between Beck and me," Miley continued. "We were drunk, we were high on coke and Mary Jane, emotions were raw following the loss in the World Cup, and things just came together like that."

"Don't worry about that, Miley," Jade said. "That's all in the past now. I've found it hard to let go of the past before, but now it has to be done. What matters is what lies ahead of us. I've already heard from the airline's lawyers, and they found the booze and drugs in your blood and his. There's already rumors that the airline has managed to get your blood junked from being evidence in court, which means only Beck can be proven to have drunk and snorted before the flight."

Jade turned and looked Miley in the eye. "I don't care what you and Beck did in Brazil, Miley," she said. "But we both know that he's a good man. If the jury sees him as some kind of alcoholic addict—and that's very likely to happen what with what your lawyers are doing—Beck's name is gonna become mud. Please, Miley, for Beck's sake, for Beck's memory, don't let him take the fall for your problems."

Jade went on out to the street, leaving Miley quite baffled and conflicted with herself.

* * *

A/N: Sorry if this took so long. Also, forgive me if some of the characters are out of character. This is AU, after all. I'm trying to stick as close to their canon personalities as possible, but there's only so much I can do within the story I've made around them.


	10. Difficulties of Fame

The days following the funeral of Beck Oliver had been some of the busiest in Miley Stewart's life this side of her pop star career. The paparazzi, which had practically disappeared from the front of their house ever since she had made the decision to retire Hannah Montana, had slowly but surely returned to their house ever since someone got wind that the Captain Stewart who had piloted Cash Airlines Flight 4892 was the same Miley Stewart that had been Hannah Montana's alter ego. Said paparazzi had been one of the many reasons why Miley had decided to retire Hannah, and now it was making her post-crash life just as difficult. And as if that wasn't enough, the mainstream media had also joined the paparazzi in camping out on their front yard, waiting for a chance to get Miley's side of the story as far as the crash was concerned.

Jackson Stewart, Miley's brother, was in the kitchen searching the refrigerator for some food when he heard someone knocking on the door. Experience had taught him to look out of the window before opening the door, as Miley-as-Hannah had almost been ambushed by the paparazzi that way. Looking outside the window, Jackson saw a black man sporting a long beard and dressed in shabby clothes. He was carrying a large brown paper bag filled with groceries, and two cartons of milk were at his feet. "Delivery for Miley Stewart," the man said.

"Come on in, Cory," Jackson said. "Let me take those from you." He took the bag of groceries from the black man, who seemed very relieved of having been relieved of his load. He picked up the gallons of milk at his feet and followed Jackson into the kitchen.

"Hey, Miles, a homeless black man's here with some stuff for you," Jackson called out as he laid down the bag on the Formica counter. Beside him, the "homeless" man had taken off his knit cap and shabby longcoat, revealing a neatly-pressed three-piece suit underneath that could have been made by any European fashion line. "Oh, man, does it feel good to be out of that old coat," Cory Baxter said as he laid down the coat on the counter.

Miley finally came down to the kitchen from the house's attic. She was wearing a black shirt and white shorts and she was barefoot. She also carried a shotgun of some kind with a chromed barrel, which she laid down on the countertop as soon as she got into the kitchen.

"Whoa," Cory said, staring at the shotgun. "Planning on going postal now?"

"Nah, man," Miley replied. "Just cleaning up some guns I found in our attic. What reason do I have to go postal anyway?"

"She said before going on an inexplicably unexplainable shooting rampage," Jackson added, and he and Cory did a high-five.

"You two won't be laughing when I really do it," Miley said. "Oh, is that milk? I really need my milk fix right now." Miley grabbed one of the milk jugs and downed half of its contents in just a few seconds.

"Mind if I check this out?" Cory asked, reaching for the shotgun. Miley's head moved up and down from behind the milk jug in a gesture that could have been a nod, and Cory took it as her consent to him touching the gun. "Looks like an 870," he said. "Is it an 870?"

"Yeah, it's a Remington 870 Field Gun," Miley said once she was finished draining the milk jug. "Cory, how is it that you're very curious about this gun?"

"Nothing, I just like guns," Cory replied. He pumped the action four times, and four shells came out. He pumped the action a fifth time, but no more shells came out. Cory picked up the four shells and laid them on a neat line on the counter beside the shotgun.

"Hey, what's this I hear about a homeless man and a shotgun?" another much older voice asked. Robbie Ray Stewart came out from the living room and into the kitchen. "Miles, what's that thing sticking out the back of your shorts?" he asked his daughter.

"What, this?" Miley pulled out a strange-looking pistol from behind her back. "It's just some pistol that I found up in the attic," she said. "I was bored; I don't have anything to do, so I began rooting around the house for things to keep me occupied. I went up to the attic, began cleaning up some of the old guns that I found there, and then I found this."

"Well, well, well," Robbie Ray muttered. "I think this might be the Colt Woodsman that my granddaddy gave me for my tenth birthday. I thought I'd lost it when we moved here to California, but now I think this might be it." He picked up the gun and examined it. "Well, will you look at that? It _is_ the gun that my granddaddy gave me. I remembered the serial number by heart, and there it is on the slide, clear as day. Now let me tell you something interesting about this gun of mine. A few days after my birthday, I accidentally shot one of our free-range chickens on the family farm with it. Of course, I didn't admit it at first, but Grandpa—your great-grandfather, kids—had a way with getting the truth out of people. Probably had something to do with him being a justice of the peace, but I digress. I confessed to Grandpa, and I told him that I just wasn't responsible enough for the Colt. And do you know what he said? He told me that by admitting that I wasn't responsible enough to own a gun, I had just proved that I _was_ responsible enough. Yeah, I know it's some kind of paradox or something, but once you get to be my age, it will all make sense. Anyway, enough about my life story. What brings you here, Cory? And since when did you grow yourself a beard?"

Cory looked down at the flowing salt-and-pepper beard that was covering the lower part of his face. He then pulled it up and above his head, revealing it to be a fake. "D'you like it, Mr. Stewart?" he asked. "It's from a Santa costume that I wore for the kids two, three years ago. Anyway, I'd come down here to give Miley her milk fix, as she likes to call it, and to tell her that the NTSB wants to take an official statement from you three days from now."

"All right by me," Miley said. "Even though I've already talked to their main investigator, that Evans girl, it's still no biggie. Three days from now? Pfftt."

"Yeah, actually, Miles, it's not as easy as that," Cory added. "I also came down here on personal orders from Theo Brabant himself. I was to confine you in a specially prepared hotel room in one of Mr. Dobson's hotels so that me and the other legal advisers of the airline can keep a close eye on you. Since your blood tests were released to the company, they aren't really trusting of you running around on your own. Now, I know that the drinks in Sao Paulo just before the flight were just that—drinks, nothing to suggest alcoholism about it. But you know how the advisers are. They're like a hive mind. You either go with the majority or you're out of their little group. They want to lodge you in a hotel room with no alcoholic drinks in the minibar so you won't come to the official NTSB investigation late and wasted."

"Wow," Miley muttered once Cory's words had sunk in. "That sounds harsh, man. I haven't even touched a single bottle since the crash."

"I'm sorry, Miles, but orders are orders."

Miley let out a huge sigh. "Oh, all right," she said. "But how do you expect me to get past that mob of paparazzi and media out there on our front yard waiting for me to come out of the house?"

"Just do what I did, and put on a disguise," Cory replied matter-of-factly. "That should be easy for you. You used to do that kind of thing for years."

"Oh, fuck off, Baxter," Miley said, but deep in her mind the wheels of plot began to turn. Before she had used the Hannah Montana persona to keep herself away from the rest of the world. Could she somehow use her past to give her a hope of having a better future?

While Miley was still deep in thought, Cory had put his "homeless" clothes back on. "I'll be waiting for you down the road at five in the afternoon later today," he said. "Just tell me what you'll be wearing so I won't be so surprised when I see you again." With that, he returned his false beard back on his face, and Cory Baxter the homeless man walked out of the kitchen of Miley Stewart' house.


	11. Escape From Malibu

Both the media and the paparazzi had been staked out in front of the Stewart residence for just about a week now, hoping to catch a glimpse of the pop-star-turned-pilot Miley Stewart, who had sort of regained some of her former fame as Hannah Montana thanks to her actions as pilot-in-command of Cash Airlines Flight 4892 saving the lives of most of the passengers and crew onboard her plane. Stewart had turned into a recluse following her release from the hospital just about two weeks ago; having declined to give a comment to anyone at all. The airline's legal representatives, but mostly Cornelius Baxter, had urged the media to give Captain Stewart some space, but the press and the paparazzi just couldn't resist the temptation of getting even one tiny glimpse of the pop-star-turned-pilot.

The paparazzi had been trying their very best to get a glimpse of Miley in her house, but the thick curtains had served as an effective deterrent to that. But they did know that one thing was certain: Miley Stewart was human, and like all humans, she had needs, and sooner or later she would have to go out of her house to get what she needed for herself. And when that time came, they would be waiting for her with their cameras and flashing lights. All they had to do was wait.

Meanwhile, in the back of the Stewart residence, another drama was unfolding. The back of the house was on beachfront property; private property of the Stewarts in fact. It meant that there was no one there who wasn't supposed to be there.

A man with dirty blonde hair peeked out of the back door of the Stewart residence. He looked around, saw that there was nobody there on the beach, and withdrew his head back into the house. A short time later, the door opened once again, and another figure stepped out of the house. This one was a woman, and she had frizzy blonde hair that was in dire need of the attention of a wet comb. She was wearing a black leather jacket over a simple white shirt and a pink pencil skirt. Her feet were in well-worn flip-flops. And despite the time of day—the sun had already set over much of the West Coast—she was wearing an outrageously big pair of horn-rimmed sunglasses that would be more at home in the Eighties than the New Tens. All in all, she looked like a certain pop star that had disappeared from the limelight so-and-so years ago.

"Hey, Miles," Jackson Stewart asked from behind the door, "are you sure that that disguise will work?"

"Of course it will work," Miley Stewart replied. "Nobody thought that I could possibly be Hannah Montana before, and anyway, by the time anyone realizes that Hannah is back in the living world, I'll be long gone by the time they've finished their double take."

"Just make sure of that, little sis," Jackson said. "Otherwise you're gonna be in some deep, deep shit. Anyway, where did Cory say he was gonna pick you up?"

"Just a few blocks down the road, over by the Harpers' place."

"All right. Good luck, Miles. And don't get seen!"

Miley began the slow and arduous journey from the back of her house to Cory Baxter's car. After he had told her that the NTSB had wanted to interview her in three days' time, Cory had come back to pick up some clothes and "girl stuff" to stash in the hotel room where Miley was going to be spending those three days leading up to the NTSB interview. They had agreed to that plan when she realized that she did not want to be carrying her stuff while trying to sneak her way past the media and the paparazzi.

Miley bent down to a crouch as she neared the edges of the spotlights that the media had erected on their house's front lawn while waiting for her to come out. She bent down behind a large berm of sandy soil. Miley eventually went down on her knees and began to crawl on the ground like a soldier. The farther she got from their property, the more nervous she became. Finally the lights bathing her house faded into the background, and she picked herself up off of the ground and brushed off the sand on her clothes and legs. Now all she had to worry about was one of her neighbors deciding to go out for a late-night swim.

The lights of the Harper residence finally appeared out of the murky gloom of the encroaching dark after five minutes of half-walking and half-crawling on the beach. She skirted down the boundary of the property until she finally found herself back on the street. It was deserted, save for a few parked cars here and there. Still, it was a definite improvement over the patch of road in front of her house, which was practically crowded with media people and their respective vehicles and equipment.

Miley looked around. There were actually quite a lot of Voodoos in this area. Either the people living here were all onanists, or Miley had somehow stumbled into the Jamaican part of town (Voodoos being associated with local Jamaican gangs along with compulsive masturbators in the public psyche). But once she noticed a distinct lack of white smoke hanging over the area like a creeping fog, she immediately scratched that particular theory.

Miley finally found a familiar dark purple Voodoo parked underneath a palm tree. There was a man standing beside the car, wearing some kind of long orange cotton shirt with a blue African tribal pattern on the bottom, worn-out denim jeans and what looked to be a leopardskin toque. All in all, he looked like a cheap knockoff of Mobutu Sese Seko.

The man got into the car as soon as he saw Miley walking towards him. She got into the passenger seat, removed the blonde wig and the sunglasses, turned to face the man and said, "This better be worth all of this effort, Cory."

"Oh, don't worry about it, Miles," Cory Baxter replied. "Trust me, it _will_ be all worth it." And with that said, he turned on the engine and got on the road.

"Man, what kind of a silly disguise is that?" Miley asked as she stuffed her wig and sunglasses into a small plastic bag.

"What, oh, this?" Cory looked down on his clothes before turning back to the road. "Oh, this is my African immigrant's disguise. Someone may have already seen my homeless black man disguise earlier. And of course everyone knows my American businessman disguise."

"What if someone sees us in this car?"

"Like you said before, Miles, all people are gonna see driving this car is an onanist. They won't even notice that I've got a girl sitting beside me."

"Yeah, right," Miley muttered as they got onto the freeway. "Remind me why Brabant wants me to be stashed in some hotel room again."

"Well, aside from the obvious..."

"What the fuck is 'the obvious,' Cory?"

"We don't want the media to get their hands on you before the government does, Miles. Let's be honest about that."

"All right, I get that. Now what about those other reasons?"

"You'll find out soon enough."

They spent the rest of the drive in silence, with the occasional curse coming from Cory whenever he got cut off in traffic or something in his car failed to work the way it was supposed to work. Miley took the time and opportunity to absorb the views of Los Angeles on the ground level. It sure looked different down here than when she was up in the air, flying Boeings and Airbuses in and out of LAX. Up in the air, all she could see were the buildings and skyscrapers, but down on the ground, she could see the many people going in and out of the buildings on their way to work or home. Oh, what she would give just to be one of those normal and regular people.

"Here we are," Cory said, taking Miley from her reverie back to the real world. "This is the place."

Miley looked up at where Cory had stopped the car. The building's name was advertised on the front through bright and colorful neon lights. "Seriously?" she asked him. "That's its name?"

"I know," Cory said with a laugh. "Unbelievable, right?"

The joint's name was Hotel California, like the song. It was quite the combination of the old and the new: the building's facade was made to look like an old-fashioned courthouse that one might find in America's small towns. Behind the "courthouse" was a massive glass and steel skyscraper, which was where the hotel itself most probably was. Miley had no idea who had designed the place, but she felt confident that a lot of people shared her opinion that whoever had thought of the design for the place should never have graduated from wherever design school he or she had come from.

"Dear God in heaven," Miley said. "Who thought up of this place? And who owns it?"

"Apparently, it's the Big Boss himself, Cabot Dobson," Cory replied. "Our young recluse of an owner apparently also has a chain of hotels to his name, and he had this place built to be his flagship hotel. I think he wanted to go for a _Back to the Future_ look; you know, the one where Biff takes over America and builds his hotel on top of the courthouse?"

"So that 's why it looks so familiar," Miley muttered. "But why name it Hotel California? I mean, it's just such a cliche."

"What can I say?" Cory shrugged. "Maybe the Big Boss likes the song. Hang on a minute for me, Miles. I gotta get out of this suit and into my real suit." That was just a matter of him taking off his orange shirt to reveal that he was actually wearing a business shirt underneath the orange shirt.

The two of them entered the lobby. Cory talked to the concierge, who looked at Miley at least three times during their conversation. Finally the concierge handed Cory an electronic keycard. "Glad that's over," he said to Miley once he was finished with the concierge. "Come on, your room's on the twenty-seventh floor."

Cory and Miley boarded an elevator that was "reserved" for "special" guests of the hotel, and Cory inserted a key—an actual key as opposed to the new cardlike keys favored today—in a slot beside the button marked P. Once he turned the key, the button lit up, and the elevator closed and brought them up to the twenty-seventh floor.

"Penthouse for me, huh?" Miley said. "Wonder which suite I'll be getting."

"I wouldn't exactly call it a suite," Cory replied. "But it's richly decorated, if you know what I mean."

The elevator dinged as they arrived at their destination floor. Miley yawned to clear the pressure building up in her eyes. Being in an elevator was kind of like being in a plane. Beside her, Cory did the same, and then they stepped out of the elevator. "So, where's my room?" Miley asked.

"It's not one of those newfangled Imperial Suites, I have to tell you that," Cory said. "But the Big Boss is willing to put you up in one of the Countess Suites. It should be down here." Cory walked over to a door marked 2720, inserted the keycard that the concierge gave him into the appropriate slot, waited for the light to turn green, and then opened the door. "Voila!" he said.

The room was definitely decked out in rich people's trappings, Miley admitted. But it still wasn't as richly decorated as some of the more expensive hotel suites she'd stayed in at times, but then she expected that when Cory had told her not to expect anything too lavish. "Is this it?" she asked.

"In all of its glory," Cory replied. "I already went ahead and put your stuff and clothes in the walk-in closet, and your girl stuff is in the bathroom. D'you like it?"

"Very nice," Miley muttered as she took in the place. "Wanna stay for a while, have a drink or something?"

"Well, I have to get back home soon, but what the hell? That can wait. Just nothing alcoholic for me, Miles. I'm driving."

"Got that, man." Miley walked over to the minibar and opened it. Inside were cans of soft drinks and iced coffee, and bottles of mineral water and iced tea. Miley grabbed a can of root beer for Cory, and then she began rooting around for the hard stuff. But, strangely, there wasn't any. Usually there were small bottles of alcoholic beverages ranging from tame options like champagne and gin tonic to the really strong stuff like scotch and vodka. But there were none of that inside this particular minibar. "Hey Cory, I can't find any alcoholic stuff in here," she said. "You might want to tell your concierge buddy about it." When he didn't immediately reply, she called out, "Cory, you still there?"

"Yep, still here," Cory replied. "Listen, about that... Brabant decided that it would be in everyone's best interests if you didn't have any alcohol in your room. You're already on a lot of people's shit lists when Tommy Bagration had your blood tests inadmissible as court evidence, and the company just can't have you drunk as an owl coming into the interview with NTSB."

"Well, they're risking a lot for nothing. I'm not gonna get drunk, Cory, I swear."

"Don't worry, Miley. Once the interview with NTSB's over, we're gonna turn you loose."

"But—"

"No buts, Miley. Brabant said so, and that's that. I'm just following orders."

"Yeah, that's what the Nazis said too."

"Don't go Godwin's Law on me, Miley Stewart. I'm not trying to harm you here. This is for your sake, and for the company's."

"Wow," Miley muttered after a few moments' thought. "So this is how the company takes care of its employees."

"Not my decision," Cory replied, spreading his arms in apology.

"Well, fuck me." Miley plopped down on the sofa and spread her arms wide as well. "Who am I to fight against that?"

"Just don't think about it, Miley," Cory replied. "Don't think about it, and it'll all be over in the blink of an eye."

"All right, fine," Miley said. She tossed the can of root beer to Cory. "Here you go, you bastard," she said.

Cory caught the can, but he immediately put it back down on the table. "No thanks," he said. "You need this more than I do. Anyway, I have to go now. I'll be back to pick you up in two days for the drive to NTSB."

"Yeah, whatever." Cory walked out of the room, leaving Miley alone to stew in her own thoughts. She allowed her mind to open up and throw obscenity upon obscenity on anyone and everyone she could think of that had gotten her in this situation: Theo Brabant, Cory Baxter, Cabot Dobson, Thomas Bagration, the Boeing Aircraft Company, Los Angeles International Airport, and even herself. Finally, the fires of anger died down within her, having eaten up everything within Miley. She sighed as a familiar feeling of emptiness washed over her, and then she finally reached for the can of root beer, opened it, and drank.


	12. The Last Temptation of Miley Stewart

After sitting down and giving it a great deal of thought, Miley finally decided that maybe getting stuck in a hotel was not the worst thing to happen to her in this week. Not only was she now far away from the all-seeing eye of the media and the paparazzi, she could now do everything—well, almost everything—that she ever wanted to do without looking over her shoulder and trying to see if there was someone keeping an eye on her for whatever reason. She had felt very much like a bird cooped up in its cage during her stay at her father's house in Malibu, and she couldn't even talk to her friends except over the phone, and everyone knew that NSA listened in on everyone's conversations these days.

Sure, there were still a few things that hadn't changed when Miley swapped Malibu for Cabot Dobson's Hotel California. She couldn't step out of the hotel, just like how she couldn't step out of the house in Malibu, but the reasons for it were different, though. Miley couldn't step out of the house in Malibu because of the press waiting outside, and it was almost the same thing in the hotel. Theo Brabant and Cory Baxter wanted Miley to stay inside the hotel so that she wouldn't end up doing anything stupid that the press could pick up and run with. The head honchos of Cash Airlines also wanted Miley to be in just one place so that they would always know where she was, and that she could be picked up quickly and immediately once it was time for her to face the NTSB.

There were actually a lot of things that she could do in the hotel. Miley thought that she would get bored in the hotel almost immediately after she set foot in it, but Miley had come to realize that this was false when she was already on her third 4-D movie in the hotel's own miniature cinema theatre. There was also a gaming room, a gambling hall, three swimming pools, and a bungee jump, among other things, in Hotel California to keep its guests entertained. By the night before Miley was supposed to testify before the NTSB, Miley had seen about fifteen movies, won and lost over 3600 dollars in the gambling hall, swum seventy laps in the pools, and jumped the equivalent of two Hotels California with the bungee jump.

The only problem that Miley had with her "hotel confinement" was the fact that she couldn't drink any alcoholic drinks for the duration of her stay. She honestly thought that this was a shit condition for her stay in the hotel because she wasn't that much of an alcoholic and alcohol didn't have anything to do with the crash of Flight 4892 in her opinion. Still, three days after she had gone to stay at the hotel, she had not once had the urge to drink some alcohol, although there were times which she needed some alcohol of the rubbing kind to dress a few scratches.

It was the end of a day that had felt both too long and too short at the same time. Miley felt light as she boarded the elevator that would take her to her suite. She'd gone into the casino with 2000 dollars and left with only 600 bucks left in her pocket. She greeted the girl manning the elevator and nodded her head. During her three-day stay at the hotel, Miley and the girl had gotten to know each other very well. The two of them talked until the elevator finally arrived on Miley's floor, when Miley got off and said goodbye. She took out her keycard and inserted it into the proper slot, waiting a few moments for the light to turn from red to green, before opening the door and going in.

"Finally!" she muttered as she plopped down on the couch and lifted her feet up onto the table. Just a few hours from now, she was going to be out of this place and testifying in front of the National Transportation Safety Board and giving her version of the events leading to the crash of Cash Airlines Flight 4892.

Miley undressed and stepped into the shower. It was during moments like these that she liked going naked into a small glass cubicle, turning the faucet and letting rivulets of water flow down her body as she gathered her thoughts. She already had her testimony ready and waiting for tomorrow, and all she had to do was run over the events as she remembered them and then string them together into a logical timeline of events. Once that was dealt with, her part in the drama would be over, and she could now wait for the next time that Cash Airlines would call her up for a flight.

When she felt herself getting sleepy, Miley stepped out of the shower, towelled herself dry, and slipped into comfortable night clothes. Just as she was about to climb into bed, however, she noticed that one of the doors in the bedroom was slightly open. Miley was just about to close the door when she noticed that the door led to the suite beside hers. "What in the world?" she muttered as she stepped into the neighbouring suite. The other room was empty, and Miley couldn't remember trying to open this door, so it must have been one of the maids or the cleaners who had left this door unlocked.

Miley ventured deeper into the room. There was indeed no one inside, as someone would have definitely made their presence known once she had stepped inside. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw that she was inside the suite's kitchenette. And then she saw, very clearly, the dull metallic gleam of the minibar. Miley tiptoed over to the minibar and opened it. It was stocked to the brim with drinks ranging from Pepsi to Perrier every other drink which name started with P. Miley suddenly noticed that her throat was very, very dry, and she had to take a deep breath to collect her thoughts. It had been three days since she had drunk her last alcoholic drink, and while she wasn't a chronic drinker, a bottle or two did help her get through the day.

"Oh, man," Miley said to herself. "Oh, my God. Sweet nibblets!" She clapped her hand over her mouth and began breathing deeply. "Okay, Miles, get a grip," she said to herself. "You've lasted three whole days without a single drop of this stuff. You don't need to break the fast tonight."

"Eh, one drink won't hurt," she finally conceded, and she reached in and took out a small bottle of Finlandia vodka. She unscrewed the cap on the bottle and tipped her head back to drink.

* * *

It was still early morning in Los Angeles when a Declasse Voodoo with a metallic purple paintjob pulled up to the lobby of the Hotel California, and two men dressed in sharp suits stepped out of the car. One of the men, the driver, handed over the keys to a waiting valet, and the two men then made their way into the hotel. They called up the elevator and waited patiently while the car took them to the twenty-seventh floor.

"Based on what I heard from my contact within the investigation, the NTSB is still convinced that pilot incapacitation played, if not a major role, then a minor one in causing the crash of Flight 4892," Thomas Bagration said to Cory Baxter. "To be honest, I must have set off all kinds of alarm bells when I had the pilots' blood test results inadmissible in court, but that's the price you pay in my line of work."

"Think about it from the NTSB's point of view, man," Cory said. "Why would an airline make all this effort to invalidate the blood test results of a single pilot if she didn't have anything to do with the crash? It's not the smartest of decisions from Brabant, but the man's really convinced that the ATC is at fault and that the controller should hang for this instead of one of his own pilots. He wants to convince the NTSB of that too, which is why he's spouting off such bullshit like Miley's elevated blood alcohol count serving only to, quote, 'distract the investigation', end quote, from determining the true cause of the crash."

"He's certainly not doing a good job of convincing them if he goes about it this way," Bagration said.

"Amen, man," Cory said. "Well, you know Brabant, Tommy. "Once he's convinced of something, it's as good as gospel, and he'll go through hell and high water to preach his word to the people."

The elevator pinged when they arrived at their destination. Cory led the way and then used his own keycard to unlock and open the door to Miley's room. "Hey, Miley!" he called out. "Girl, you here?"

"Are you sure that this is the right room?" Bagration asked in a whisper.

"Of course I'm sure it's her room," Cory retorted. Then, in a louder voice, he called out again, "Miley! I've got someone who wants to talk to you, girl! Help me find her, man!" he told Bagration.

"All right, man, no need to be bossy," Bagration said as they ventured deeper into the room. He entered the bedroom, where he saw that the bed appeared unused. "That's strange," he muttered to himself. Then he edged open the door to the bathroom, which was slightly ajar. What he saw inside shocked him to the core. "Cory!" he called out. "Come here now!"

"Why? What is it?" Cory asked as he made his way to the bedroom, and then he saw what had made Bagration all shaken up. "Holy shit!"

Miley Stewart was lying on the floor of the bathroom, her head resting on the cold porcelain of the toilet seat. Bits of vomitus were still scattered inside and around the bowl of the toilet, having survived repeated attempts at flushing. She was wearing nothing but a white tank top and pink panties, but this escaped the notice of the two men.

"Miley! What the hell happened to you?" Cory shouted. Miley tried to reply, but all that came out of her mouth was an unintelligible groaning and mumbling.

"Tom! Quick! Help me get her out of here!" Cory put his arms under Miley's armpits while Bagration grabbed her ankles. Together, the two of them took Miley into the bedroom, where they laid her down on the bed. "Miley, hey, Miles," Cory called out to her. "Can you hear me?"

"Call…" Miley finally said clearly.

"Call who?"

"Call… Gibby."

"Who's Gibby?"

"Phone. Tell him… situation."

"Ah, shit," Cory muttered as he rubbed his eyes vigorously. "Who the fuck is Gibby? Fuck this shit!"

As Cory rummaged around the room looking for Miley's phone, Tom Bagration said, "I think I know why our friend got smashed last night."

"Oh, what is it now?" Cory asked in an exasperated tone.

"Take a look at this," Bagration said as he led Cory to the door connecting the two suites. The lawyer opened the door, revealing a cluttered mess of empty and half-empty bottles of liquor from the minibar in the suite beside Miley's. "She must have boozed herself to sleep," he said.

"Who the fuck unlocked the connecting door, man?" Cory asked. "His ass is going to get sacked once I get my hands on his name!"

"Well, for what it's worth, I don't think he or she, whoever he or she really is, matters to us the most right now," Bagration said. "We can't bring Captain Stewart to the NTSB looking like this. She's got freaking vodka and Famous Grouse coming out of her pores, goddamn it! She's going to tear the whole case apart!"

"Looks like there's only one thing that we can do now," Cory said in agreement. "Call this Gibby guy."

Cory finally managed to find Miley's phone buried beneath a pile of her clothes. He searched for Gibby on her contacts list and, once he found the name, called the number.

"Hey, Miley, my girl, whassup!" a boisterous voice said from the other end of the line. "Haven't heard from you for like, three days already! You looking to hook up some quality Colombian?"

Cory took a deep breath before speaking up. "Are you Gibby?" he finally asked.

There was a noticeable pause before the other guy spoke up again. "Who the fuck is this!?" he asked back, his voice no longer as boisterous or jovial as before. "Who the hell is Gibby? Why the fuck do you have my friend's phone?"

"Gibby, relax," Cory said. "This is Cory Baxter of Cash Airlines speaking. I'm a friend of Miley's."

"Oh, really? Are you now?"

"Look, enough of this bullshit, okay? Miley's currently in a situation right now, and she asked me to call you so I could tell you that she's currently in a situation. Got that?"

"A situation, eh? Where the hell are you?"

"The Hotel California, right between Hollywood and Vinewood."

"I'll be there in twenty."

However, it was thirty minutes before Cory and Bagration heard a knocking on the door. "Who is it?" Cory called out.

"It's Gibby! You called me, like, thirty minutes ago."

"What took you so long, man?" Cory asked as he opened the door. A short and chubby man with a boyish face, a loud yellow Hawaiian shirt, and carrying a large gym bag barged his way into the room. "It's a combination of the notorious LA traffic and me scoping the place to make sure this isn't a cop sting. All right, somebody clear up that table for me," he commanded. "It's time to work that famous Gibby Gibson magic."

"Are you Gibby?" Bagration asked.

"What's it to ya?" Gibby said in reply.

"Nothing, just asking," Bagration said, raising his arms to his chest in defense.

Gibby laid down his gym bag in the middle of the table and took out a Ziploc bag containing a suspicious white powder. He poured out a small amount of the powder on the table and, using a credit card, arranged the powder into six small neat rows. "Just arrived from Mitu," he said more to himself than to anyone else. "They make some of the best product in the world." He rolled up a dollar bill and put one end of the tube into his nostril and the other end above a row of cocaine. "Let's do a test run," he said.

Gibby snorted the line of coke in one long breath. He leaned back to let the drugs be absorbed by his system, and he sniffed once and wiped his nose, and then he said, "Oh, that shit is really, _really_ good. Bring Miles out; she should try this shit 'cause this is _the_ shit."

Cory shook Miley to a state of wakefulness, which was just enough to get her walking with some help from the bedroom over to the living room. There, he sat her down in front of the table, right in front of the lines of coke. "Try it, Miles," Gibby told her. "It's the best Colombian you'll ever gonna sniff."

"If you say so…" Miley took the rolled-up dollar bill from Gibby and snorted the second line of coke. "Hoo-wee!" she shouted suddenly. "Whoa, there! Oh, yeah!"

"Great," Tom Bagration muttered to Cory. "Now we're to bring a drunken drug addict of a pilot to the NTSB."

"At least she's awake and conscious," Cory said.

"Not an alcoholic, my ass," Bagration muttered. "She's a functioning alcoholic and addict, that's what she is."

"Hey!" Gibby called out. "You guys need a little something something for yourselves?"

"You got some Mary Jane in that bag of yours, man?" Cory asked. "My family's got a history of glaucoma, you know… better safe than sorry, I always say."

"No pot brownies right now, man, sorry," Gibby said. "But I do have some of the real thing. Got it from a secret farm over in New York." He brought out another Ziploc bag which contained leaves. "You don't mind making your own joints, do you?"

"Just give me the good stuff, man," Cory said. "I can handle this. I've done this before."

"How about you, man?" Gibby asked Bagration. "Can I help you at all?"

"No thanks, I'm good," Bagration replied with a shake of the head.

"I got some hashish and a hookah if you're into that sort of thing."

"Like I said, no thanks." As Bagration leaned back on the couch and watched his companions take in all sorts of drugs, he turned to Cory, who was already halfway through his joint, and said, "Theo Brabant is going to need a lot more help than this if he wants things to go his way."

"True that, Tommy, true that," Cory said from behind some aromatic smoke.


End file.
